La Riboteuse hollandaise

1644–1655 · Werkzaam in

Leiden

c. 1655

Moves from Leiden to Amsterdam

With money troubles during the First Anglo-Dutch War he moved to Amsterdam — though other accounts say he settled there only in 1657, living in Leiden with short breaks until then. He lived in an alley on the Prinsengracht next to a brewery and near his relatives, the children of the sugar refiner Philips Metsu; in Amsterdam he came under the influence of Gerard ter Borch and possibly Pieter Codde.

1657

A quarrel with a neighbour and a move beside the vegetable market

In 1657 he quarrelled with a neighbour (it was alleged that Metsu had left a brothel at six in the morning) and moved to a house on a canal-side where a daily vegetable market was held.

1657–1667 · Werkzaam in

Amsterdam

27 april 1658

Married: Isabella de Wolff

early 1660s

Turns to the Leiden “fijnschilders”

At the onset of the 1660s he turned for inspiration to the art of the Leiden “fijnschilders” (“fine painters”), whose origin is traced to Dou: their paintings on wood or copper are marked by exceptional rendering of minute detail and a smooth, glowing surface. He was apparently responding to the market for Dou’s paintings, which Dou sold at exorbitant prices.