Nicolaes BERCHEM (1620-1683) Lot n° 36

Animal market in front of an ancient ruin Large oil on canvas. Size: 100.5 x 89.8 cm Dutch painter, draughtsman and engraver of the golden century born in Haarlem and died in Amsterdam, he is one of the great landscape artists of his time. Berchem knew how to render the effects of light with skill and had the propensity to bring to life, sometimes in the same composition, graceful characters alongside peasants. Prolific painter counting among the principal Dutch Italianists, Louis XIII buys him 24.000 francs a landscape which is always in the Louvre. A precursor of rococo painting, Berchem influenced a whole generation of artists, even in France with painters such as Boucher and Oudry.