The great beech, with two men and a dog.

Jacob Isaacksz van Ruisdael (c. 1628/9-1682) was a Dutch painter, draughtsman and etcher. He is generally considered the pre-eminent landscape painter of the Dutch Golden Age, a period of great wealth and cultural achievement. Ruisdael created uncanny dramas from looming clouds passing over wheat fields, windswept trees, and towering windmills. “He demonstrates remarkable skill in locating the exact point at which the creative faculty comes into contact with a lucid mind", the famous German writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe once wrote of the painter.

Realising the growing appeal of foreign landscapes had for Dutch collectors, Ruisdael set out for the rugged German border country around 1650 in search of inspiration. This etching, one of only thirteen he completed in his lifetime, grew out of that trip. Full of personality, the exaggerated beech tree clinging tenaciously to the bank shows itself to be a survivor, as well as a symbol of transience amid the relentless cycle of growth and decay. Like the pair of dwarfed travellers, we are meant to contemplate life's impermanence and the heroic power of untamed nature.

This etching is a posthumous, 18th century second state impression. An unidentified printmaker etched the sky and the billowing clouds at upper left shortly after Ruisdael's death in 1682. It was donated to the Colonial Museum by Bishop Ditlev Monrad in 1869 and is part of Te Papa's foundation art collection.

Sources:

Artnet, 'Jacob van Ruisdael', http://www.artnet.com/artists/jacob-van-ruisdael/

Minneapolis Institute of Arts, https://collections.artsmia.org/art/55067/the-great-beech-tree-with-two-men-and-a-dog-jacob-van-ruisdael

Wikipedia, 'Jacob van Ruisdael', https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacob_van_Ruisdael

Dr Mark Stocker   Curator, Historical International Art   March 2019