Going Dutch

The Sackler Wing of the Royal Academy is currently in deep-green livery to conjure up a rus in urbe setting for the grandest of the Dutch landscape painters of the 17th century — Jacob van Ruisdael. The first impression is a dark one — storm-tossed seas and forests, cloud-filled skies: the untamed might of nature and plenty of lush verdure. The painted green of the gallery walls is here and there relieved by pale-grey partitions, like silver birches in a conifer wood, upon which smaller works can be hung. (There’s an excellent sampling of Ruisdael’s powerful black chalk drawings made from direct observation.) The screens provide extra wall space for this dense exhibition: 50 paintings and 36 drawings and etchings are hung in the relatively confined spaces of the Sackler. The hanging echoes the nature of Ruisdael’s compositions, packed with incident and detail of quite remarkable accuracy.

The exhibition is curated by the American scholar Seymour Slive, who brought us a memorable Franz Hals exhibition (also at the Academy), back in 1990. Slive has devoted much time and energy to the study of Ruisdael, publishing a catalogue raisonné on the artist five years ago, and now writing all the text for the beautifully produced catalogue (£24.95 in softback). For the most part the catalogue is clearly and gracefully written, with a useful chronology and three main essays — on Ruisdael the landscapist, on his early collectors and critics, and on Constable and Ruisdael. The Gallery Guide pamphlet, also written by Slive, is an excellent short introduction to the show; I’ve rarely come across one as good. In it he stresses Ruisdael’s surprising versatility: ‘No other old master or modern artist can match the variety of landscape subjects he depicted.’ It’s a bold statement, but I’d like to know who could challenge it.