ABRAHAM BLOEMAERT (GORINCHEM 1564/6-1651 UTRECHT)

Farmhouses such as the one shown here, together with dilapidated houses and ruins, frequently appear in Abraham Bloemaert's drawings. These buildings, drawn on the spot, were often later used in the artist's more finished prints, drawings and paintings. This is also the case with the present drawing; it can be found in a more finished drawn composition, with the addition of shrubs, a milkmaid and animals in the foreground, which was previously with Bob Haboldt, Paris (see J. Bolten, op. cit., I, pp. 454-455, no. 1549; II, fig. 1549). Jaap Bolten dates the present sheet to circa 1595-1605 and the more finished version to circa 1615-1625.