View of a Cottage on a Hill

This c.1650 view of a cottage on a hill is relatively unusual in Ruisdael's output, since the Dutch landscape rarely afforded genuine hills. The elevated cottage may depict a site near the dunes or the Gelderland inland, where modest rises in the terrain created views otherwise absent from the flat polder. Ruisdael painted the modest rural dwelling without sentimentality, placing it in a broader landscape that suggests the cottage's smallness against the forces of sky and weather. The painting belongs to the productive middle period of his career, when his landscapes acquired their characteristic blend of realism and quiet melancholy.

The slight elevation of the cottage allows Ruisdael to set it against an open sky rather than framing it with trees, giving the composition unusual airiness. The building is painted with sturdy, broad strokes; the surrounding vegetation is worked in varied greens with broken highlights.