SIBERECHTS, Jan
(b. 1627, Antwerpen, d. ca. 1703, London)

Landscape with Rainbow, Henley-on-Thames

c. 1690
Oil on canvas, 83 x 103 cm
Tate Gallery, London

Even in its later period, Flemish landscape painting retains the main distinguishing characteristics that emerged as early· as the 16th century in the works of such atrists as Pieter Brueghel and Momper.

This painting shows a sweeping view from a slightly elevated position, sloping down over the cattle pastures in the foreground towards a river plied by a cargo boat on the left and with a village on its banks to the right. Towards the background, the terrain slopes upwards again, with fields under changing sunlight and clouds, and a double rainbow in the sky. On the left, the view broadens out into the background towards the hills on the horizon.

A Dutch landscape painting, for example by Ruisdael, could hardly be described in this manner. Unlike Flemish landscape paintings. their Dutch counterparts rarely include so many different and contrasting elements. Here, we have proximity and distance, hill and plain, animals, people, boats and houses. While Flemish landscapes frequently have a universal theme, Dutch landscapes tend to concentrate on a single aspect. This painting is typical of the later work of Sibcrechts, who emigrated to England in1672. Whereas his Flemish landscapes generally portray a small detail, his later work is topographically more precise; on the right we can recognize the village of Henley-on-Thames.