# Wheat Fields

**Jacob van Ruisdael** (Dutch, 1628/29–1682)  
ca. 1670  
Oil on canvas  
39 3/8 x 51 1/4 in. (100 x 130.2 cm)

Courtesy of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 14.40.623. [The museum's record](https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/437549).

## 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._

Jacob van Ruisdael painted this in about 1670, aged about 37. It is now at The Met in New York.

### 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](https://www.ochreeditions.com/artists/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._

## Facts

- Type: Paintings
- The artist was about 37
- Real size: about 39 × 51 in (100 × 130 cm). The original is larger than our largest print, 20 × 30 in, so every print is a reduction.
- Century: 17th century
- Subjects: Roads, Landscapes
- Colour: grey
- Rights: public domain (CC0 1.0); free to use for any purpose.

## Get it

- Free download, full resolution: https://img.ochreeditions.com/m/1151.jpg?dl=1
- Image: https://img.ochreeditions.com/a/1151/1920.jpg
- Giclée reproduction on Hahnemühle Photo Rag: 8 × 10 in $28; 11 × 14 in $38; 12 × 16 in $42; 16 × 20 in $56; 18 × 24 in $68; 20 × 30 in $86
- Framed reproduction: 8 × 10 in $78; 11 × 14 in $98; 12 × 16 in $108; 16 × 20 in $138; 18 × 24 in $164; 20 × 30 in $208
- Canvas reproduction: 8 × 10 in $58; 11 × 14 in $72; 12 × 16 in $79; 16 × 20 in $98; 18 × 24 in $118
- Print-ready file: 8 × 10 in $2; 11 × 14 in $2; 12 × 16 in $3; 16 × 20 in $3; 18 × 24 in $3; 20 × 30 in $5

Sizes stop where the museum's file would print below 150 pixels per inch. Everything sold is a reproduction, made to order. [Order a print](https://www.ochreeditions.com/art/wheat-fields-met-437549).