Schepen op een kalme zee bij zonsondergang

Dated 1687 and held by Amsterdam's Het Scheepvaartmuseum — the national maritime museum — this sunset seascape belongs to Van de Velde's mature English period, when his studio on the Thames had become the acknowledged centre of marine painting in Britain. The Dutch title translates as ships on a calm sea at sunset, and the work exemplifies the lyrical, peacetime register of his output alongside the battle and storm subjects. By the 1680s the Anglo-Dutch Wars were over and both nations were moving toward the alliance that would culminate in William III's invasion of England in 1688; the tone of marine painting shifted accordingly toward celebration of seafaring rather than its violence. Het Scheepvaartmuseum's collection of Van de Velde works is among the most important anywhere, preserving both finished paintings and the thousands of preliminary drawings that underpin them. Sunset lighting posed particular challenges in oil paint, and Van de Velde's solution — warm glazes over a mid-toned ground — became a template for later marine painters including J.M.W. Turner.

The warm amber and rose of the sunset sky is achieved through multiple thin glazes of lead white, yellow ochre, and vermilion over a buff ground. Water reflections mirror the sky colours in broken horizontal strokes. Ship silhouettes are painted dark against the light source, their details suggested rather than fully described in the backlighting.