Royal Picture Gallery Mauritshuis, The Hague
12 November 2009 – 28 February 2010

Philips Wouwerman (1619-1668) is currently considered the most successful painter of horses of the Dutch Golden Age. His paintings were eagerly sought after by burghers and princes throughout Europe. Not only was he more famous in his own time than Rembrandt, he was also extremely productive. Although he died at a relatively young age, almost 600 paintings are attributed to him. The exhibition On Horseback! The World of Philips Wouwerman, which runs from 12 November 2009 until 28 February 2010 at the Mauritshuis, focuses on the work of this artist, who is relatively unknown today. Thirty-three of Wouwerman’s paintings and ten of his drawings will be on display. As many as a third of these works are from private collections: the Mauritshuis is delighted to be able to display these works to the public for the first time.

Horses take centre stage

A large number of Wouwerman’s works include scenes in which horses take centre stage. No other painter captured the world of the horse with as much variety and affection as Wouwerman. With his depictions of horsemen, soldiers, stables, hunting parties, blacksmiths and army camps, he made an important contribution to 17th-century Dutch painting.

Artistic development

At the start of his painting career, the style and themes of Wouwerman’s work were strongly influenced by the Haarlem painter Pieter van Laer, and to a lesser extent by Adriaen van Ostade and Jacob van Ruisdael. Over the years, however, he developed his own individual style and succeeded in depicting established subjects in a new, original way. He was also exceptionally productive and versatile. In addition to horses, he painted scenes of everyday life, religious subjects, landscapes and a number of seascapes. From around 1650 onwards, Wouwerman evolved into one of the great landscape painters of his age, using brighter colours to paint complex compositions in an elegant style.

Fame and Glory

Philips Wouwerman was greatly respected as a painter both during his lifetime and after his death. His work was highly valued and found its way into important royal collections that now form the core of important international museum collections. Catherine the Great (1729-1796), for example, had more than forty paintings by Wouwerman in her collection. Today, these paintings are in the State Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg. Stadholder William V (1748-1806), Prince of Orange, whose paintings form the basis of the Mauritshuis’s present-day collection, owned nine paintings by Wouwerman. For just one of these paintings, he is known to have paid the then astronomical sum of 4,575 guilders, many times more than was being paid for works by Rembrandt or Vermeer at that time. This masterpiece, Battle Scene (c.1655-1660), is still in the Mauritshuis’ collection and will take a prominent place in the exhibition.

More information:

www.mauritshuis.nl