Landscape with Open Gate

In this small work, so evocative of the windswept coastal landscape near Haarlem, Pieter Molijn has captured the essence of early seventeenth-century landscape painting. His bold and fluid brushstrokes create a vigorous and animated scene. The painting appears to be a spontaneous record of a view that the artist happened upon while traveling along a sandy road near the Dutch coast. Molijn situates the viewer below the horizon, facing a road with neither beginning nor end; in this way, the vista remains limited, and the sky becomes an active element in the scene.

Molijn was one of the most innovative landscape artists of his day, ushering in the tonal phase of Dutch landscape painting by limiting his range of motifs and color tonalities. He also combined an unprecedented sense of realism with powerful diagonal compositions and strong effects of light and dark. Molijn’s distinctive style influenced the work of his Haarlem contemporary Salomon van Ruysdael (1600/1603–1670) and of Jan van Goyen (1596–1656).