Countryside with Rapids

Navrátil’s miniature gouache landscapes - often of similar dimensions and presentation to facilitate their grouping - were in their time very popular. Although the hundreds of cabinet pictures of Alpine mountain ranges, their valleys and lakes are to some extent obviously marked by routine, they nonetheless are exemples of brilliant brushwork and an exceptional feeling for colours, light and atmosphere. Navrátil arranged space in several planes and with sweet Rococo pastel colours of pink, pale-green and blue-silvery gouache values he convincingly put on canvas the mood and character of nature at sunrise as well as in a storm, the airy lightness of clouds and the shining water surface. Navrátil found his motifs in prints and engravings, as well as on his frequent travels. As he modified and paraphrased them with great charm and astonishing inventiveness and imagination, the viewer is never bored by their similarities.