SwissArtGallery · Documented identity

Nicolaes Pieterszoon Berchem

Alongside Jan Both and Jan Asselijn, Nicolaes Berchem is associated with the second generation of Dutch Italianate landscape painters. He created idealised landscapes in which figures and animals appear in a southern light. A painter of animals, he contributed to the landscapes of Jacob van Ruisdael and Jan Hackaert by introducing figures and animals into them; the sources also mention his collaborations with Jan Wils. One source characterises his approach as a pastoral style combining a certain realism and rustic simplicity with the picturesque quality of ruins and decorative fantasy.

The son of the painter Pieter Claesz, he first trained with his father, then continued his apprenticeship in Amsterdam with Nicolaes Moeyaert between 1639 and 1641. In 1642, he was registered with the Haarlem Guild of Saint Luke under the name Claes Pietersen. After living in Amsterdam with his family in the late 1650s and throughout the 1660s, he returned to Haarlem in the spring of 1670 and lived on the Oude Gracht. He died in Amsterdam on 18 February 1683. The pupils whom sources associate with Berchem include Karel Dujardin, Abraham Begeyn, Willem Romeyn, Hendrick Mommers, Johannes van der Bent and Dirk Maas.

The extent of his oeuvre is estimated at more than eight hundred paintings, about five hundred drawings and around fifty prints. His prints include five series of etchings known as Animalia; one, made in 1644, depicts cattle, while another, dating to around 1650, is devoted to sheep. From the mid-1650s, his prints tend towards a sophistication tinged with classicism; some pared-down compositions of sheep focus on the animals and dispense with human figures. Works cited in public collections include an Italian Landscape with Shepherds and a Flock near a Bridge, dated 1651 and held at the Castello Sforzesco; Muleteer Woman near a Ford, around 1660, at the Louvre; and Peasants with Four Oxen and a Goat at a Ford near a Ruined Aqueduct, dated 1655–1660, at the National Gallery in London. The publication Nicolaes Berchem. Im Licht Italiens is listed as an exhibition catalogue published in Ghent in 2006.

This profile brings together identity references for Nicolaes Pieterszoon Berchem and paintings, drawings and works on paper documented in auction catalogues.

Documented auction references

18auction references

6auction houses

5documented results with prices

Lempertz · Kornfeld · Schuler · Dobiaschofsky · Piguet · Zofingen

References include catalogue entries and available results; they do not all represent completed sales. Attributed works and special lots are excluded from the priced results.

Works recorded at auction

Kornfeld · Lot 2117

Italienische Küstenlandschaft mit Turm und Gebäuden, links mit Kühen beladenes Fährschiff

Black chalk with grey pen wash on laid paper

Catalogue period : 2024-09-12

Published result : 8200 CHF

Hammer price, excluding fees

Estimate : CHF 5000

Nicolaes Pieterszoon Berchem

Documented auction references

Works recorded at auction

Italienische Küstenlandschaft mit Turm und Gebäuden, links mit Kühen beladenes Fährschiff

Nachfolger Capriccio mit Bauern an einem Bach

Southern Landscape with Shepherds and Their Animals

Landschaft mit Überfall

Young shepherdesses with cows and sheep

Circle of

References excluded from statistics: attributions and special lots

In the manner of Nicolaes Berchem — Shepherd and shepherdess with cows

D’après Nicolaes Berchem — Bergères et troupeau dans un paysage italien

After

Follower of Nicolaes Berchem — Cow, goat and two sheep at the watering trough

After

Circle of Nicolaes Berchem — Livestock outside a farmhouse

Follower of Nicolaes Berchem — Landscape with a shepherd and flock

In the manner of

In the manner of

Dans le goût de Nicolaes Berchem — Paysage de campagne

In the manner of

Suiveur de Nicolaes Berchem — Choc de cavalerie, impliquant des turcs et des autrichiens

Sources and references

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