REMBRANDT VAN RIJN Landscape with a Cottage and Haybarn: Oblong.
Etching and drypoint, 1641. 129x321 mm; 5 1/8x12 5/8 inches, thread margins. Usticke's only state (e), with the densely cross-hatched central portion of the plate strong and velvety dark with no signs of wear, the background crisp and clear and with abundant burr in the lower left corner on the grass and lower right corner on and around the signature. Partial Basilisk with the initials RP watermark (Ash/Fletcher 12 A' a.,; there is an identical watermark on another impression of this subject in the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D. C.) Ex-collection Charles Delanglade (Lugt 660, verso); and two unknown collectors, ink stamps verso (not in Lugt).
This is one of Rembrandt's most celebrated works and among his most sought after landscape etchings. While it is possible that Rembrandt worked on his landscape plates out of doors in the countryside he was rendering, there is considerable scholarly debate as to the exact location of this particular scene. Most Rembrandt specialists agree that the town in the distant left background is Amsterdam, though various different identities have been suggested for the large country house in the far right background. Other of the more generic landscape motifs are almost surely created from the artist's imagination or brought together from various sketches he made from nature. Bartsch 225; Biörklund 41-A; Hollstein (White and Boon) 225.
