Church Interior
ca. 1670
To meet the expanding art market of the seventeenth century, Dutch artists often specialized in new genres such as still lifes, landscapes, portraits and church interiors. In this invented interior, observe how De Witte uses light to create both architectural volume and a sense of spirituality. If you bring a different kind of attention to the image, you can watch it become a series of flat, overlapping rectangles, anticipating the twentieth-century abstractions of another Dutch painter, Piet Mondrian.
Oil on wood
18 7/8 x 16 1/2 in. (48 x 41.9 cm)
Samuel H. Kress Collection
61.176
Provenance: Lady Cosmo Bevan (Marion L. Sulivan), Dorking, Surrey, England; Baroness Anne Beauclerk Dundas Dickson-Poynder Islington, London, Chippenham Wiltshire, and Highland Scotland; [her sale, Sotheby's, London, June 20, 1951, no. 41A]; [David M. Koetser Gallery, 1951-1954]; purchased from Koetser by Samuel H. Kress Foundation, New York, January 20, 1954; Seattle Art Museum, since 1954, accessioned 1961
Photo: Paul Macapia