Jan van der Heyden, 'A Farm among Trees', about 1670

There is something rather mysterious about this rare – and tiny – landscape by Jan van der Heyden, who specialised in painting urban scenes in a highly precise and realistic way. In this picture he has, instead, thrown a sort of veil over the buildings, a screen of trees which obscures our view. Instead of the detailed brickwork he usually delighted in articulating, he gives us only a hazy impression of the walls and roof of the building. We can’t even be sure which of the dark shapes on the ground floor is a window and which is a door.

The title, which would have been given to the painting long after it was painted, describes the building as a farm. But given the water in the foreground it’s also possible that this is a mill house. Perhaps we are looking at the pool which feeds the race and drives a wheel on the far side. We can’t be sure. The only hint of what lies beyond is the end of a punt moored to the bank at the extreme right of the picture.

The sense of mystery is also enhanced by the lighting effects. Van der Heyden suggests a day of bright sunny spells. Grey clouds loom, but there is plenty of blue in the sky and the tops of the trees seem to be caught by sunshine, especially on the left-hand side of the picture. There is warmth in the air, too: the cowherd on the river bank is either wearing shorts, or has rolled up his trousers. He’s happy to leave one leg dangling in the water while he washes the other foot. Next to him, a thirsty sheep cranes its head to drink.

Despite this, there is deep shade in the foreground, muting the colours into an earthy assemblage of greens and brown. We struggle to make out the details of the figure on the bank and the scattering of sheep and cows in the gloom of the underwood. The slightly ruffled waters of the pool reflect back only the sombre shadows of the trees and buildings.

The combination of water in the foreground, with a dark wood backlit by a brighter sky beyond is reminiscent of another painting in our collection, made about 45 years earlier: A Landscape with a River by a Wood by Cornelis Vroom. It is unlikely that van der Heyden would have seen it, but it was one of the first examples of the tradition in which he was working.