Canal Lanscape with Trees

A field of stark winter trees borders a canal and rutted country path, opposite a field that lies fallow for the season. The trees seem planted purposefully for building materials or fuel, since two are felled at left. Gorter emphasizes the subtlety of the Dutch winter landscape, with tonal greens, grays and browns below the grey clouds punctured by the blue sky beyond.

Arriving in Amsterdam in young adulthood, Arnold Marc Gorter studied drawing at the city's teachers' school before finishing at the art academy in 1891. He made many trips into the countryside, especially in picturesque eastern regions of Twente and Drenthe, after he specialized in landscape painting. A president of the artists' association Arti et amicitiae, he was a favorite of the Dutch Queen Wilhelmina.