Moses Striking the Rock

Moses, in turquoise, pink and blue robes, strikes the rock at Horeb with his rod and water gushes in thin streams into a pool, around which men, women and children in teal, shell pink and pale yellow bend to fill jugs and pans, while a horse, a goat, a dog and a cat lapping from a pewter dish crowd the shimmering foreground beneath a pale sky seen through the trees. Painted in 1624, this Exodus scene exemplifies Joachim Wtewael’s lifelong mannerism — elongated figures, contorted poses and alternating light and dark in elegant, deliberately artificial pastel colour. The story carried a special charge for Wtewael, a fervent supporter of the House of Orange: the Dutch read Moses leading Israel out of bondage as the image of their own revolt against Spain, with William the Silent as a Moses who, like his biblical counterpart, died before the promised land of an independent republic was won; Wtewael painted this panel just as Prince Maurits and Frederik Hendrik renewed the fight after the Twelve Years’ Truce. The panel was long attributed to the obscure Jan Baptist de Wael in English and German sales before the National Gallery of Art acquired it in 1972 with the Ailsa Mellon Bruce Fund. The painting is held in the National Gallery of Art, Washington.