Beneath a vast formation of creamy billowing clouds a heavily armed Dutch merchantman fires a salute. Alarmed by the sudden noise a bunch of seagulls fly up in all directions. The enormous vessel is dangerously close to the shore. Another three-master can be seen in the middle zone and a third is at anchor in the far distance. In the foreground are two transport vessels, probably kaags. The horizon is a coastline with a town. The faint silhouette of a plump tower can be made out.

Aernout Smit was an accomplished marine specialist who took his inspiration from Ludolf Bakhuizen and his teacher Jan Teunisz Blanckerhoff.[i] His paintings have often been mistaken for works by these artists. Smit indeed also copied works by, for instance Bakhuizen. In a notarial document of 1689 the artist declared that he had copied a view on the IJ on commission for a certain Hendrick Grel.[ii]

Aernout Smit was a prolific painter and his preserved output spans a wide range of marine subjects. He depicted seas as well as inland waters. His paintings show a great variety of shipping in different weather conditions. His stormy seas with sweeping clouds are spectacular. In his calms with their silvery tonality, of which our painting is a good example, Smit strikes a completely different mood. Smit only very rarely dated his paintings.[iii] The present evocative calm is therefore important in tracing the artist’s development.

Documentary evidence relating to Smit’s life is scarce. He was probably born in Amsterdam. In a notarial document of 1667 the artist lists his age as “about 26”, which puts his date of birth in 1640/41. The said document reveals that Smit was employed by the art dealer Laurens Cornelisz de Coninck, for whom he presumably painted. According to the eighteenth-century biographer of artists Arnold Houbraken, Smit studied with Jan Teunisz Blanckerhoff, who worked in Amsterdam between 1659 and 1666. In 1688 the artist is mentioned as a member in the Amsterdam painters’ guild records.