A woodland road with travellers, herdsmen and cattle,
oil on copper, 23 x 33 cm, framed

The late Klaus Ertz had suggested an attribution in full to Jan Brueghel the Younger. His written certificate, dated July 2023, accompanies the present painting.

The ongoing success of the Brueghel workshop after 1625 was due to Jan’s painting skills which rivalled those of his father. Following closely what Jan had learned in the paternal studio he emulated his father’s highly detailed style, catering for the demand for this type of works. As Ertz observes the present work was executed in the later 1620s and relates to a picture signed by Jan Brueghel the Elder and dated 1611 (see K. Ertz/C. Nitze-Ertz, Jan Brueghel der Ältere, Kritischer Katalog der Gemälde, Freren 2008, vol. I, cat. no. 71, pp. 186-87). A drawing by Jan Brueghel the Elder in the Nationalmuseum, Stockholm (inv. no. NMH 1942/1863) served as the basis for both paintings. From a slightly elevated viewpoint, the composition opens to a country road, lined by dense woodland. The vanishing point in the far distance is marked by a steeple and other buildings around. The viewer is granted a window into the routines of daily village life: travellers make their way through the scene in carts, on horseback or on foot, the dress of those in the foreground painted with violets, blues and vivid reds, in contrast to the transparently painted figures in the middle distance. On the lower left a cart passes a stream, and the water spraying from the hooves of the horses is rendered in great detail. While the version painted in 1611 is an autumn scene, the painting offered here depicts the forest in late summer. Appropriate to the season, most of the leaves are still green, and the light refracts the water to be turquoise.