- Written by L.C.Geerts
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Famous Dutch Painters from Dordrecht, Ancient Capital of Holland
Part 23
55. Jacob van Strij
56. Abraham Susenier
Note : Please do not email me with technical questions about paintings and their age and origin because I am not an expert but I only have gathered information about the Painters from the Netherlands and specially from Dordrecht.
Dordrecht is not only known as the oldest city and ancient capital of Holland but also for the many famous painters who were born or lived in Dordrecht during the late Middle ages and later centuries.
On the next pages you can find many works from these famous painters who were responsible for many styles of paintings and they immortalized the daily life and landscapes in the 15th to 19th century. Most of their masterpieces are nowadays part of collections in museums all over the world and of which many can be seen in the local Dordrechts Museum.
Jacob van Strij
Dordrecht 1756 - Dordrecht 1815
Like his brother, Abraham learned to paint from his fater Leendert van Strij (1728-1798). From 1774 he also studied two years at the Academy in Antwerp. The Antwerpse history painter Andreas Lens (1739-1822) continued his training. In 1781 Jacob returned to Dordrecht. Jacob van Strij was an excellent landscape painter in the spirit of Aelbert Cuyp. He imitated Cuyp's smooth color palette and paint area and competed with him in the composition of the landscape. Sometimes van Strij copied Cuyp's paintings in detail, but usually only on certain grounds. He was often accused to be a slavish imitator or forger of Cuyp. Jacob van Strij painted also wallpaperspreads, ocasionally with his brother Abraham.
Landscape with river and trees in the neighborhood of Dordrecht
Jacob van Strij
Oil on panel70,7 x 95cm
Dordrechts museum
The painting is reminiscent of the forested landscapes of Meindert Hobbema (1638-1709). Just as painters from the Golden Age, van Strij added the most attractive elements of nature together. Thus, the fortres-likebuilding on the left based on one of the city gates of Dordrecht. The casing around the tower there is by van Strij fantasized.
With this painting van Strij developed his own character. He became incresingly removed from its seventeenth century predecesors. This painting anticipates the romantic period of a few decades later, with painters such as Barend Cornelis Koekkoek and Willem de Klerk.
Series of seven wall paintings with Dutch and Italian landscapes
Jacob van Strij, c. 1790
Oil on canvas
Dordrechts museum
These paintings belong to a series of wallpaper systems that Jacob made for a house on the Groenmarkt i Dordrecht. The series includes several landscapes from Italy, to pure Dutch. The sunny, Italian-like landscapes betray the influence of seventeenth-century painters such as Aelbert Cuyp and Jan Both (1618-1652). For the landscape with trees and livestock van Strij used motives after the work of Paulus Potter (1625-1654).
Until the end of the nineteent century the wall spreads stayed in Dordrecht. Then they moved to a house in Gelderland. The Dordrecht Museum acquired the series in 1976.
Series of seven wall paintings with Dutch and Italian landscapes
Close up
Jacob van Strij, c. 1790
Canvas wallpaper 230 x 186 cm
Dordrechts Museum
Series of seven wall paintings with Dutch and Italian landscapes
Close up
Jacob van Strij, c. 1790
Dordrechts Museum
Landscape with trees and cattle near Dordrecht
Jacob van Strij
Oil on panel 69,4 x 87,5 cm
Dordrechts museum
Around 1800 Jacob tried in his work to surpass the bright and sunny landscapes of Aelbert Cuyp. The rider on horseback, he literally copied from one of most famous paintings of Cuyp, Landscape with cattle, equetrian and farmers. In 1764, an engraving of the painting was produced. Van Strij must certainly have known the print.
Cuyp's composition, bt mirrored, as in the print - is in Van Strijs landscape clearly recognizable. However, the atmosphere is very different. This is due to a difference in practice, Cuyp worked on a dark background, van Strij on a muscular white. The light shines through the colors supporting over and enhanced brightness.
Summer scene outside Dordrecht
Jacobvan Strij
Oil on panel 65,7 x 81,5 cm
Dordrechts museum
In his later landscapes van Strij uses for the trees often a striking yellow-green. This was in response to a critics in 1811, who rejected van Strijs entries for an exhibition, because he saw two paintings "beautiful ordinnce, but in my opinion is of similar nature, as I have never such a green seen in the shadows of trees.
Winter scen at the Devel in Zwijndrecht
Jacob van Strij
Oil on panel 68,8 x 90,7 cm
Dordrechts Museum
Besides a large number of summer landscapes Jacob painted only a few winter scenes. On this winter scene we see in the distance, the Great Church of Dordrecht. The wide, bright landscape with low horizon recalls seventeenth-century painters such as Jacob Ruisdael (1628/29-1682) and Adriaen van de Velde (1636-1672).
Five wall paintngs
Abraham and Jacob van Strij
Oil on canvas : 2 x 238 x 189 cm, 1 x 239,5 x 113,5 cm, 1 x 239,5 x 112 cm and 1 x 238 x 229 cm
Dordrechts Museum
Abraham and Jacob van Strij painted aseries of five chamber wall spreads for an unknown client in Dordrecht. The series is among the best the brothers have made in this genre.
The wall systems were for long time no longer in their original place. In May 2005 they were by the owner put on the market. At Sotheby's in Amsterdam, the five piecs should be auctioned separately, but fortunately, at the last moment the Dordrechts Museum could be purchased as a whole series In the future, the series will be shown in full glory in a reconstruction of the original situation.
Landscape with horseman and milk-maid
Jacob van Strij
Paper, pencil and paintbrush in grey en black 53,3 x 64 cm
Dordrechts Museum
Landscape with dead tree
Jacob van Strij
Oil on panel 69,3 x 90,5 cm
Dorrechts Museum
Mountain landscape with river
Jacob van Strij
Oil on panel 68,9 x 86,2 cm
Dordrechts Museum
Michiel en Cornelis Pompe van Meerdervoort
Jacob van Strij
Oil on panel 69 x 91 cm
Dordrechts Museum
Draining of the water from the in 1809 broken dikes in Alblasserwaard (near Dordrcht)
Jacob van Strij
Oil on panel 73,8 x 93 cm
Dordrechts Museum
Winter landscape with farm hoses and two children on the way
Jacob van Strij
Aquarelle 52,6 x 70,2 cm
Dordrechts Museum
Riverview with rapids
Jacob van Strij
brush in bruin 12,8 x 17,8 cm
Dordrechts Museum
Landchape with cows at a river with boats
Jacob van Strij
Brush in black, gray and brown 27,4 x 36,1 cm
Dordrechts Museum
Summer landscape outside Dordrecht
Jacob van Strij
Brush in gray and brown 33,2 x 41,7 cm
Dordrechts Museum
River view with rider
Jacob van Strij
brush in black, gray and brown 12 x 19 cm
Dordrechts Museum
The yacht of the VOC-Chamber of Rotterdam greeting a Dutch East Indie shipand a warship at the coast of Hellevoetsluis
Jacob van Strij, 1790
Maritiem Museum Rotterdam
Sheep
Jacob van Strij
Teylers Museum, Haarlem
River Landscape with man on horseback, shepherd and cattle
Jacob van Strij
Pen in brown, red and black, brush in black and brow, brush in water and body-color, pencil 44.1 x 57.8 cm
Teylers Museum, Haarlem
Landscape with Figures, Cattle and Sheep
Jacob van Strij
oil on panel; 36 x 42 cm
Ashmolen Museum at the University of Oxford, UK
Landscape with Cattle
Jacob van Strij, c. 1800
Oil on panel 80 x 107.3 cm
Metropolitan museum of art, New York
Dutch winter landscape with frozen river and farm with thatched roof, in the foreground a figure with sleigh and a lady with a creel basket
Jacob van Strij
Oil on canvas 66 x 82 cm
Private collection
The Grotekerksbuurt (The neighborhood of the Dordrecht Minster)
Jacob van Strij
Paper, pencil and paintbrush in grey en black
Private collection
Holland
Jacob van Strij
Oil on canvas 56 x71 cm
Private collection
Two Boeiers and a Cat under Sail
Jacob van Strij
Oil on canvas, 212 x 189 cm
Private collection
This painting, depicting two boeies and a cat under sail with other smaller vessels moored at the end of a jetty, with figures near a lantern on the jetty, formed pat of a rare set of six wall-hangings by the brothers Jacob and Abraham van Strij. Only very few complete or almost complete sets have survived, one of which, a set of seve, is now in the Dordrechts Museum, Dordrecht, and another set of five is in the Haags Gemeentemuseum, The Hague. Wall-hangings became very popuar in the second half of the 18th century, when several factories in Amsterdam were established producing thse wall-hangings for the canal houses. The workshop of the Strij brothers also produced wall-hangings which are often signed by only one artist, the ain contributor, in this case Jacob. However, in most cases the hand of both painters can be seen.
Autumn Landscape
Jcob van Strij
Oil on canvas, 229 x 210 cm
Private collection
This painting, depicting an autumn landscape with a shpherd and his herd and travelers near an inn, formed part of a rare set of six wall-hangings by the brothers Jacob and Abraham van Strij. Only very few complete or almost complete sets have srvived, one of which, a set of seven, is now in the Dordrechts Museu, Dordrecht, and another set of five is in the Haags Gemeentemuseum, The Hague.
Wall-hangings became very popular in the second half of the 18th century, when several factories in Amsterdam were established producing these wll-hangings for the canal houses. The workshop of the Strij brothers also produced wall-hangings which are often signed by only one artist, the main contibutor, in this case Jacob. However, in most cases the hand of both painters can be seen.
Abraham Susenier
Leiden ca.1620 - Dordrecht 1666/72
From before 1646 - the year he arrived in Dordrecht - little is known about Abraham Susenier. Shortly after its establishment in Dordt he became a member of the painting fraternity. Documents of ceditors seem to indicate that Susenier had regular financial difficulties. The most famous works of Susenier are still-lifes. A few seascapes have survived.
Susener should have been quite diverse, in seventeenth-century Dordtse inventories are seveal type of paintings mentioned, for example, 'a viswyf-ken' (fish woman) and 'twee lantschappe' (two lasndscapes) "de stadt Dordt" (the city of Dordrecht" and "een Swean" (a Swon).
In his still-lifes Susenier often made variations. He combined painted fruit still-lifes and flowers, shells and vanitas objects. There is also a known painting of him with fish. His images of tables with fruit, flowers and utensils have often a light landscape in the background.
Still-life
Abraham Susenier
Oil on panel 52 x 90 cm
Dordrechts museum
Om this still-life was the signature "A.Susenier', but disappeared during a cleaning of the painting. However, the painting is attributed to Susenier becsause typical for him is the way the grape vines in the composite are situatedl and th silhouette against the bright background.
Still-life with shells
Abrahm Susenier, 1659
Oil on canvas 58,2 x 85,3 cm
Dordrechts museum
This painting is unique in Susenier's oeuvre. It is one of the few Dutch still lifes from the seventeenth century with shells as main object. Most shells on this painting come from the East Indies area, a few are from other parts of the world.
Vanitas still life with a skull, feathers, an overturned Roemer, a sculpture and a portfolio of drawings
Abraham Susenier
oil on canvas 60.3 x 74.3 cm
Private collection
A Still Life with a Basket of Grapes, a Lemmon on a Pewter Plate and a Roemer
Abraham Susenier
Oil on panel 54.6 x 59.7 cm
Private collection
A Still Life with a Lobster, Roemer, Clams, Grapes, and a Knife
Abraham Susenier
oil on canvas 38.5 x 50.5 cm
Private collection
A still-life of a lobster on a blue and white Wang-Li dish
Abraham Susenier, 1666
Oil on Canvas 83 x 111 cm
Private collection