Login

Country

Cart

Your cart is empty

Horizontal Antique Paintings

About this collection

A wide wall asks for a wide picture. These horizontal antique paintings, from the 17th to the 19th century, are chosen at the size that suits a mantel, wider than they are tall and neither small nor oversized.

The fireplace decides the shape. Most of these works are landscapes, fields, rivers and flocks under a wide sky, with Old Master compositions beside them, and many are signed. To choose the right size for your own mantel, read our guide to choosing a painting for above the fireplace.

French oil on canvas of fishing boats moored in a harbour, in a gilt frame with carved corner ornaments

French School, early 20th century

Fishing Boats in a Harbor
$1,900
Eliezer offering the gold bracelet to Rebecca at the well, a dozen women with water jars before Roman architecture, oil on canvas after Nicolas Poussin

French School, circa 1800

Eliezer and Rebecca at the Well
$4,700
Willow leaning over dark water with reeds and a gold field beyond, signed oil on canvas

James Desvarreux-Larpenteur (1847-1937)

Pollarded Willow, 1921
$1,900Signed
Signed Venice lagoon scene by Pierre Forest, three lateen sails in ochre and rose above a blue hulled boat, oil on board in a carved giltwood frame

Pierre Forest (1881-1971)

Sailing Boats, Venice Lagoon
$2,900Signed

Guides · before you buy

The Barbizon School in PaintingA village an hour from Paris, an inn, and the painters who decided a stand of oaks deserved what the Salon gave to Ovid.Read the guideAnimated Landscapes, Figures in 19th-Century French PaintingA landscape in which figures appear, but in which the figures are not the subject.Read the guide
Sunset landscape with a shepherd and his flock in silhouette against an orange sun, in a silvered moulded frame (Etienne Mein)

Etienne Mein (1865-1938)

Oedipus and Antigone at Sunset
$3,800Signed
The unframed panel on a small easel on a marquetry desk in a panelled study, next to bound books and brass candlesticks

Tristan Lacroix (1849-1914)

Huntsman and Hounds, 1891
$2,900Signed
Sunset over the rocky Esterel coast, French Impressionist oil on cardboard, early 20th century, in a carved gilt frame

Herve Le Loup de Sainville (1861-1930)

Esterel Coast at Sunset, 1900s
$3,400Signed
The Virgin and Child at the left, the eldest king kneeling in yellow, a crowd of twelve behind, Flemish, 17th century

Flemish School, 17th century

Adoration of the Magi, 1600s
$7,900
Moonlight over two windmills beside a canal, signed oil on canvas, late 19th century, in a fluted gilt frame

European School, late 19th century

Moonlight over Two Windmills, 1800s
$3,200Signed
Signed orientalist oil painting of a palm oasis and rocky gorge at sunset, late 19th century, in a gilded wood frame

John Lewis Shonborn (1852-1931)

Oasis Gorge at Sunset
$3,900Signed
A girl in a blue skirt feeding a flock of turkeys in a shorn field at the edge of an oak wood, signed oil by Emile Michel dated 1872, in a carved gilt frame

Emile Michel (1828-1909)

Girl with Turkeys, 1872
$6,700Signed
Full view of the framed canvas, blossoming tree and thatched farm with hens, in its carved gilt swept frame

Paul Emmanuel Péraire (1829-1893)

Blossoming Tree and Farmyard
$3,700Signed
Two oxen under the yoke drawing a cart across flowering heather with sheep grazing, signed Desvarreux oil on canvas in a carved gilt frame

James Desvarreux-Larpenteur (1847-1937)

Oxen and Sheep in a Clearing
$3,700Signed
SoldSigned 19th century poppy field landscape by Rousseau with cattle and wildflowers under a blue sky, gilt frame

Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1861-1911)

Poppy Fields, late 1800sSold
Antique French landscape with four large haystacks and a shepherd driving his flock, oil on canvas in a gilded frame

Alexandre Gaston Guignard (1848-1922)

Shepherd among Haystacks
$3,600Signed
Pan and Syrinx, the nymph fleeing the god into the reeds, oil on canvas, 18th century European school, in a carved gilt frame

Italian School, 18th century

Pan and Syrinx, 1700s
$2,900
Christ and the Samaritan woman at the well, 17th century oil on canvas, in an ebonised frame with painted decoration

French School, 17th century

Christ and the Samaritan, 1600s
$5,300
Two white spitz dogs, an adult and a puppy, 19th century French oil on canvas in a gilt frame

French School, 19th century

Two White Spitz Dogs, 1800s
$2,700
A woman knitting alone in a park, signed oil on canvas by Octave Guenard, late 19th century, in a carved gilt frame

Octave Guénard (1845-1934)

Woman Knitting in a Park, 1800s
$2,700Signed
19th century French oil study of a fire by the coast with ships, oil on canvas in gilt frame

French School, 19th century

Fire by the Coast, 1800s
$5,600
Barbizon School landscape with a woman and child by the water, 19th century French oil on canvas by Edmond Renault, in an ornate gilt frame

Charles Edmond Renault (1829-1905)

Woman and Child by the Water, 1800s
$3,600Signed
A city burning on the right, Lot and his daughters in shadow on the left, Flemish, circa 1600

Flemish School, circa 1600

The Fire of Sodom, circa 1600
$8,700
Barbizon school river landscape with a cow, 19th century French oil, gilt carved frame

French School, 19th century

River Landscape with Cow, 1800s
$2,700

GalerieClub Fine Art

1,100+

paintings sold since 2017

Poppy Fields, late 1800sSold Poppy Fields, late 1800s Hagar and Ishmael, 1700sSold Hagar and Ishmael, 1700s Penitent Magdalene, 1600sSold Penitent Magdalene, 1600s

Our promise

  • Every painting photographed front and back
  • The frame you see is the frame that ships
  • Free tracked UPS Express Saver to the US

New paintings, by email

A note when new paintings come in. Nothing else.

Elsewhere in the gallery

Horizontal antique paintings for sale at GalerieClub

A painter chose the shape before the subject. A tall canvas lifts the eye toward a face, while a wide one lets it travel, and for three centuries European painters turned their canvases on their side whenever the land, the sea or a crowd of figures needed room. The antique horizontal oil paintings in this collection are all of a medium size, the scale that sits naturally above a fireplace. Smaller works hang among our small antique paintings, and larger ones among our large framed paintings.

  • The mantel is the one place in a room that fixes the shape of a painting. Designers usually suggest a picture about two thirds of the width of the mantel, hung a hand's width above it, so that frame and fireplace read as one. A medium horizontal painting fits that rule, and its frame adds to the width it shows on the wall.

  • The Old Masters used the wide format for stories that unfold across space. Biblical scenes set by a well, processions of kings and figures fleeing a burning city all need width, and an Old Master painting in landscape orientation reads from left to right like a sentence, one moment leading to the next.

  • The wide format suited painters working outdoors. Pastoral fields with oxen and sheep, river banks with figures and windmills under a moon all sit naturally along a low horizon, and many of the 19th century horizontal paintings here give more than half the canvas to the sky. More views of this kind hang among our antique landscape paintings.

    Many of these paintings are signed, and unsigned works are described by school and period, as our guide to reading an attribution explains.