Village near a Pool

Meindert Hobbema

National Gallery of Art

This painting shows a landscape with several buildings near a body of water. Closest to us, near the bottom right corner, a person in red leans over a wooden fence to cast a fishing rod into the water. The fence is surrounded by tall grass and bushes with small pink flowers. On the right, a path leads up towards the buildings. Two people and several dogs walk along the path towards us and away from the buildings, emerging from some tall dark trees. One person rides a white horse, while the other appears to hold a stick with several birds sitting on it, and offers a bird up to the rider. These people are in shadow and their details are hard to discern. Beyond them, the path curves by two large, white buildings with pointed red roofs. As the path curves to the left in the distance, it passes through a grassy plain near the edge of the water. More people can be seen, one walking along the path and two sitting by rocks near the water. The path leads towards a small village to the left of center. The village has more cottages and a church with a steeple in the distance. The sky above the scene is light blue-gray with fluffy white clouds, and the color palette includes dark greens, browns, and grays.