The Ray of Light

Ruisdael never stood at this exact spot. The sweeping valley, the four-arched bridge, the ruined tower and the distant windmill are assembled from memory and imagination into one grand panorama. What holds it together is the weather. A single shaft of sun breaks through heavy cloud and slides across the middle distance, lighting a band of fields while the rest lies in shadow, which is why the French later nicknamed the picture Le Coup de Soleil, the stroke of sunlight. Ruisdael painted it around 1665, at the height of the Dutch Republic's confidence, his brooding clouds owing a good deal to Rembrandt. More than a century on, it was bought for the collection of Louis XVI.