I.L. (ISAAC) ISRAELS 1865 Amsterdam - 1934 The Hague Rotten Row, Hyde Park, London

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This painting is set in London, where Isaac Israels had moved in 1913. He often worked there in Hyde Park, as he had enjoyed painting strolling figures in the Bois de Boulogne in Paris or in the Oosterpark in Amsterdam. In Hyde Park, he was particularly struck by people who amused themselves by riding along the wide lanes. Rotten Row, a road in the park, is still used as a bridlepath today — a remarkable spot for the upper classes to relax on horseback amid the bustle of central London. The Household Cavalry division, which performs at ceremonial occasions, also trains its horses there. This fashionable meeting place for wealthy and distinguished Londoners, who rode there to see and be seen, must have held enormous appeal for Isaac Israels. He painted several works there, each revealing his remarkable gift for capturing a characteristic moment. The black-clad horsewoman in our painting appears to pause briefly before the painter, as if to pose. She gazes down at us with a certain hauteur, yet also with an air of graciousness, fully aware of the status her class confers. That ability to render a swift, incisive character study was Isaac Israels' great talent. The painting is, moreover, a portrait of the grey horse, which possesses at least as much personality as its rider. As in a formal portrait, the background has been left vague and without detail, so as not to distract attention from the horsewoman and her mount.

Isaac Israels was a restless traveller throughout his life, and this tendency intensified after the death of his world-famous father in 1911. At the time, Israels was living in Paris and was deeply uncertain whether to take over his father's house and studio in The Hague. To postpone that decision, he resolved to seek fresh impressions in a city he did not yet know well. Although his home city of Paris offered endless possibilities, he departed for London in 1913. He rented a studio in Fitzroy Street and stayed at a hotel on Trafalgar Square. In this new city, he found fresh variations on familiar themes. He again painted people enjoying themselves in the park or on the street, ballet girls, ladies taking pleasure trips on the Thames, and riders in Hyde Park. The urban scene fascinated him equally. He liked to sit at the front of the upper deck of a double-decker bus to observe busy streets such as Regent Street and Piccadilly Circus from above. In London, he painted streets from a high vantage point, as he had already done in Amsterdam. A shopkeeper placed his balcony at Israels' disposal so that he could paint from there. After the outbreak of the First World War, however, sketching in the street was no longer permitted. Israels therefore moved his work indoors, where he painted boxers in a hall he had hired, complete with an audience.

Despite the world war having set Europe ablaze, Isaac Israels travelled across the continent with relative ease. In 1915, he went to Switzerland, to the astonishment of his friends. "Isaac is in Bern and wrote to me that he was going to Paris. He doesn't know, I think, that there is a war on, because he doesn't mention it — nor how he intends to get there, now that Italy too is at war," wrote Theo Nieuwenhuis to Willem Witsen. "Well, he is rather small — perhaps they won't notice him." Israels did indeed return briefly to Paris, where he found life rather dull now that the social scene had ground to a halt because of the war. Shortly afterwards, he was back in London, though he would not remain there for much longer. By the end of 1915, he was back in The Hague.