Artifact World Gallery
Get the iOS app

A Polder Landscape after a Thunderstorm by Jacob Maris

Jacob Maris · 1892-01-01

Jacob Maris painted A Polder Landscape after a Thunderstorm in 1892, and it hangs in the Rijksmuseum. He was the most celebrated Dutch landscape painter of the late nineteenth century and belonged to a family of artists, all three Maris brothers made their living from art.

The sky is the real subject. Maris captured the moment after a storm, when clouds still churn and light is unsettled. Water mirrors the sky. But look closely: a single figure in a tiny boat, so small most visitors walk past it.

Maris led the Hague School, Dutch painters who rejected romance for reality, flat, wet land under a big sky. His thick impasto brushwork on the trees gives the painting a physical, nearly sculptural texture.

A painting that seems at first to be only sky and water turns out to hold a quiet human presence. What have you walked past without noticing?

Details

The painter loaded the brush thick. Feel the weight.
The painter loaded the brush thick. Feel the weight.
The turbulent sky suggests the recent passing of a storm, conveying a sense of dramatic atmosphere and transition.
The turbulent sky suggests the recent passing of a storm, conveying a sense of dramatic atmosphere and transition.
The water acts as a mirror, doubling the dramatic sky and trees, creating a sense of symmetry and depth.
The water acts as a mirror, doubling the dramatic sky and trees, creating a sense of symmetry and depth.
Transcript

A thunderstorm just left the Dutch lowlands. The sky still churns. The clouds are not finished. The painter loaded the brush thick. Feel the weight. He came from a family of painters. Three brothers. One figure. In a boat. Barely visible.