(Antwerp 1587–1631)
A wooded landscape with Abraham expelling Hagar and Ismael,
oil on panel, 47 x 64.8 cm, framed

On the reverse the marks of the city of Antwerp and panel maker GG (for Guillaume Gabron).

We are grateful to Luuk Pijl for confirming the authenticity of the present painting. A written certificate is available.

Ryckaert, who was active in Antwerp in the early seventeenth century, drew his inspirations from such artists as Paul Bril and Jan Brueghel I. Having initially been trained by his father, he was later apprenticed to the landscape painter Tobias Verhaecht, who had also been the teacher of Joos de Momper. Although the artist’s Italianate style has frequently been explained by a sojourn in Italy in the years between 1605 and 1610, it is not documented that Ryckaert ever undertook such a journey. Ryckaert’s artistic production was probably rather influenced by Paul Bril’s works made after the latter’s Italian journey and which circulated in Antwerp from 1600 onwards. In 1611, Ryckaert joined the Guild of Saint Luke in Antwerp, where he was known as “the painter with one arm”. Despite his handicap he was a highly productive artist whose landscapes featuring ruins, mountains, waterfalls, and views of idyllic valleys were greatly cherished. A portrait of Ryckaert by the hand of his painter friend Anthony van Dyck is now in the Museo del Prado, Madrid.