Iconic winter sport landscape acquired by Rijksmuseum and Mauritshuis

Amsterdam’s Rijksmuseum and The Hague’s Mauritshuis have jointly acquired one of the most important winter landscape scenes from the Dutch Golden Age: Colf Players on the Ice, painted around 1625 by Hendrick Avercamp. To celebrate its homecoming, the masterpiece will first go on display in a special exhibition at the Stedelijk Museum in Kampen, Avercamp’s birthplace, from October 3rd to January 10th, 2027. After that, the two museums will split custody. This is the first time the Netherland’s two greatest museums, respectively home of Rembrandt’s The Night Watch and Vermeer’s Girl With a Pearl Earring, are sharing an artwork.

Between 1575 and 1625, northern Europe experienced a period of severe winters known as “The Little Ice Age.” The rivers, canals, lakes and ports of below-sea-level Holland froze over for months. Avercamp was the first Dutch artist to specialize in depicting winter scenes, capturing people enjoying the cold in sports like ice skating, sledding and colf, and experiencing the harshness of having to work and live in such conditions.

Colf Players on the Ice is regarded as a highlight of Avercamp’s oeuvre. Unlike in his earlier winter landscape teeming with human figures, the artist focuses here on a small group in the foreground. The low vantage point makes us feel that we too are on the ice, and part of the scene. The focus is on two men playing colf – one of the oldest ball games in the Low Countries, and a forerunner of golf – as fishers, passers-by and other spectators watch the game. The painting is therefore not only a fabulous wintry scene, it is also the earliest known depiction of colf.

Colf was a popular year-round game in the Netherlands, played in the squares, church yards and the streets of town. Like golf, it was played by hitting a ball with a club, but unlike golf, the target was a vertical stick rather than a hole. Walloping balls through the streets of small, densely-inhabited towns had the unfortunate side-effect of breaking a lot of windows, and many towns passed ordinances prohibiting the game. The icy surfaces away from windows made the ideal colfing pitch.

Avercamp’s winter scenes are filled with details, capturing people from all walks of life. In Colf Players on the Ice, the gentleman in kuitbroek (knee breeches) wields the colf club while commoners like an ice fishermen and the little boy with a net helping him watch the game. The clothes are a snapshot of fashions followed by the merchants and burghers, as well as the rugged winterwear of the working classes.

For many years, the painting was on long-term loan to the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, from the collection of British art dealers Edward and Sally Speelman. Speelman is an expert in Dutch old master paintings, and has amassed a significant private collection. They sold Colf Players on the Ice for a hefty price tag of $13 million.

The acquisition is very important for the Netherlands. Although several paintings by Avercamp are in Dutch public collections, almost all of them are early works. Colf Players on the Ice , on the other hand, shows the innovative nature of his mature style, and is thus an essential addition to the Dutch national collection.

* This article was originally published here