Oil on panel, 'Cattle on a River Bank', after Aelbert Cuyp, late 18th-early 19th century

Cattle on a river bank with a cityscape (Dordrecht ?) in the background

Bequeathed by Rev. Chauncy Hare Townshend, 1868

The Townshend Bequest was made in 1868, according to the Will of Chauncey Hare Townshend. As can be ascertained from the registered files, the bequest entered the museum in that year. In his introduction to A Descriptive Catalogue of the Historical Collection of Water-colour Paintings in the South Kensington Museum (London: Chapman na d Hall, 1876) Samuel Redgrave also gives the date of the bequest as 1868 as does Kauffman in; Kauffmann, C.M.Catalogue of Foreign Paintings, II. 1800-1900 (Victoria and Albert Museum, London: 1973). However in more recent publications the date has been given as 1869, which is the year in which the objects were catalogued.

Historical significance: Aelbert Cuyp was the painter and draughtsman son of Jacob Cuyp. One of the most important Netherlandish landscape painters of 17th-century, he combined a range of sources and influences, most notably in the application of lighting effects derived from Italianate painting to typical Dutch subjects. Such traditional themes as townscapes, winter scenes, cattle pieces were transformed under his brush and given new grandeur. Aelbert was virtually unknown outside his native town, he became especially popular in the late 18th century in England.
The cityscape in the background appears to be Dordrecht as suggested by the familiar silhouettes of the Grote Kerk (Church of Our Dear Lady) and windmill known as the Standaardmolen at the junction of the river and the Dortse Kil. The view of Dordrecht was one of the most prominent subjects in Cuyp’s oeuvre, with the depictions of the city and its environs appearing in more than 25 paintings and 10 drawings. The Cathedral and windmill both appear for example in three of Cuyps paintings dating to the 1640s-50s now in the National Gallery, London: The Large Dort, The Small Dort and the The Maas at Dordrecht in a Storm. Cuyp’s Seventeenth-Century Dutch patrons appear to have primarily belonged to the wealthy merchant class in Dordrecht and his works became particularly popular in the late 18th and early 19th century in Britain. Cuyps landscapes were were among those reproduced in John Boydell's 1769 volume of prints etched after old master paintings [Boydell, John, ed. A Collection of Prints, Engraved after the Most Capital Paintings in England, London, 1769]. The Frenchborn dealer Noel Joseph Desenfans (1745-1807) for example, whose collection now forms the basis of the Dulwhich Picture Gallery, owned at least 10 works by Cuyp. Following the British Institution's first exhibition of Old Master paintings in london in 1815, which included a notable group of Dutch and Flemish pictures, both British collectors and painters such as J.M.W. Turner and Thomas Gainsborough developed a special affection for Cuyp’s work. The collecting of Cuyp’s paintings is essentially an English phenomenon and more works by Cuyp are found in Britain than in any other country. Compared to other Dutch painters, Cuyp was discovered rather late, but once his collectability was established the flight of his paintings from Holland was immediate and total. By 1800 no significant work by Aelbert remained in his homeland. For a longer discussion of the collecting of Cuyp in England, see Alan Chong essay in Aelbert Cuyp, Arthur K. Wheelock, Jr. (ed.), Exh cat. National Gallery of Art, Washington, National Gallery, London, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, 2001-2002. The V&A picture bears witness to the popularity of Cuyps work in England in this period and was probably painted in the UK after the arrival of his first works in the 1780s.

Aelbert Cuyp was the painter and draughtsman son of Jacob Cuyp. One of the most important Netherlandish landscape painters of 17th-century, he combined a range of sources and influences, most notably in the application of lighting effects derived from Italianate painting to typical Dutch subjects. Such traditional themes as townscapes, winter scenes, cattle pieces were transformed under his brush and given new grandeur. Aelbert was virtually unknown outside his native town, he became especially popular in the late 18th century in England.
The cityscape in the background appears to be Dordrecht as suggested by the familiar silhouettes of the Grote Kerk (Church of Our Dear Lady) and windmill known as the Standaardmolen at the junction of the river and the Dortse Kil. The collecting of Cuyp’s paintings is essentially an English phenomenon and more works by Cuyp are found in Britain than in any other country. By 1800 no significant work by Aelbert remained in his homeland. The V&A picture bears witness to the popularity of Cuyps work in England in this period and was probably painted in the UK after the arrival of his first works in the 1780s.

1377-1869