Wheat Fieldsca. 1670
A sandy road runs between ripening fields of wheat towards a distant horizon, beneath a sky of towering clouds that fills most of the canvas, with sunlight and shadow moving across the land. More about this work
About this work
A sandy road runs between ripening fields of wheat towards a distant horizon, beneath a sky of towering clouds that fills most of the canvas, with sunlight and shadow moving across the land. Jacob van Ruisdael, the most influential Dutch landscape painter of the seventeenth century, could make a simple country road into something grand and moving. The low horizon, typical of Dutch landscape, gives the clouds room to build, and small figures on the road give the scene its scale.
Written by Ochre Editions.
How it was made
- Oil paint
- Pigment ground in a drying oil, usually linseed. It dries slowly, so painters could blend on the canvas, build up thin translucent glazes, and rework a picture over weeks. Canvas replaced wooden panels in the 1500s because it is lighter and can be rolled.
Jacob van Ruisdael
Dutch, 1628/29–1682 · Born in Haarlem; died in Amsterdam.
Ruisdael was the leading Dutch landscape painter of the seventeenth century. Probably trained by his father Isaack and his uncle Salomon van Ruysdael in Haarlem, he painted dunes, woods, waterfalls, beaches and wheat fields under towering skies, giving familiar scenery a dramatic, sometimes melancholy weight. He moved to Amsterdam around 1656, and Meindert Hobbema was his pupil. Views such as Wheat Fields show his gift for the low Dutch horizon and the moving clouds above it.
Written by Ochre Editions.
Rights and the museum’s record
Public domain. The Met has dedicated this image to the public domain under CC0, so anyone may copy, adapt and use it, for any purpose, without asking. Our prints and files are reproductions made from the museum’s image; the museum doesn’t endorse them.
- Object number
- 14.40.623
- Credit
- Courtesy of The Metropolitan Museum of Art
- Type
- Paintings
- Department
- European Paintings
- Licence
- CC0 1.0 Universal
- Museum record
- See it on the museum’s site
