LUDOVICO POZZOSERRATO
('Lodewijk Toeput')
ca. 1550 Antwerp - ca. 1605 Treviso

attributed
Pomona Lying on the Waterfront in Front of a Moated Castle.
Oil on canvas.
Relined.
69;5 x 55;5cm.
Frame/Pedestal: Framed.
Provenance:
Private ownership; Germany.

Lodewijk Toeput; also known as Lodovico Pozzoserrato; was a Flemish artist who lived and worked in Italy for many years. After leaving his hometown (Antwerp or Malines); he moved to various Italian centres such as Venice; Florence and Rome and finally settled in Treviso in the early 1580s. Although he executed frescoes; portraits and altarpieces for local churches; he specialized in landscape painting and; together with Paolo Fiammingo; became one of the leading painters for this typology. His soft and delicate style and his articulated compositions; which earned him the praise of Karel Van Mander in his famous Schilder-Boeck ("Book of Painters"); were inspired by the two famous Venetian painters of the time: Paolo Veronese and Tintoretto.

This painting; which for stylistic reasons can be traced back to the hand of Lodovico;
unites both the peculiarities of the artist: elegance in composition and skill in landscape painting. It depicts Pomona; the Roman goddess of fruit; the olive tree and the vine. This mythological figure; like other deities rejected in the Middle Ages; reappeared in the Renaissance as the protagonist of numerous pictorial and statuary representations. She is always depicted as a young woman with a horn of plenty or; as in this case; fruits.