A penschilderij: three-masters off a rocky coast in choppy waters

The present lot is a characteristic work by the artist, who was first recorded in 1642 in Delft, where he joined the Guild two years later. His oeuvre is limited to penschilderijen: Dr. Jan Sysmus, who kept a painters' register between 1669 and 1678, referred to him as: 'H. Witmont, groote schepen met de pen, moy' ('H. Witmont, large ships with the pen, beautiful'; see F. Lammertse, in the catalogue of the exhibition Lof der Zeevaart, 1996, p. 407). His technique differs from that of his colleagues Willem van de Velde I and Experiens Sillemans by the use of brown instead of black ink and by the concentration of dots instead of cross-hatching in the shadows of the waves and the sails. The penschilder technique was thought to be the invention of Willem van de Velde I, however, it is very probable that it was developed independently in Delft and Amsterdam at the same time.