ARTHOIS, Jacques d'

Jacques d’Arthois specialised in depicting the varied views from the edges of the forest, rather than the bosky forest interior. In the centre of the present autumnal scene, a narrow path leads the viewer’s eye to a group of travellers resting. The painting may possibly depict the Soignies area of Hainaut (now Belgium) where Jacques d’Arthois had a home, and the village seen in the distance is perhaps Casteau. He and several other artists, including Lodewijk de Vadder and Lucas Achtschellinck, who also lived and worked in the forest, later became known as the Soignies forest painters.

This unusual subject is taken from the Chronicon Helveticum written by Aegidius Tschudi (1505-72). Whilst out hunting, Graf Rudolf von Habsburg comes across a priest taking the viaticum to the dying, and in a show of piety hands over his horse for the priest to use.

The figures kneeling beside the path in the foreground are probably portraits of the patron’s family members.

The painting depicts a wooded landscape with huntsmen, drovers and cattle on a track in the foreground. A church can be seen in the distance.

The painting depicts a wooded landscape in Flanders with sportsmen on a path, mounted travellers beyond.

Jacques d’Arthois’s subject matter is usually the rich landscape in the Flanders hills around Brussels, and he seems to have taken particular delight in painting massive oak trees in the centre of his compositions.