The Fiddler

A fiddler wearing a tall hat and rags plays his instrument to a captive audience of peasants young and old in a dark interior, illuminiated by a beam of light entering through the door at left. Painter, draughtsman and etcher, Adriaen van Ostade was probably a pupil (together with Adriaen Brouwer) of Frans Hals in Haarlem. Hals influenced him very little, whereas Brouwer, had a decisive influence on the evolution of van Ostade’s idiosyncratic portrayals of peasant life. Most of van Ostade's paintings are signed and dated. 1367-1869 is among a number van Ostade's domestic scenes in which figures and space blend in an atmospheric treatment of light. The blue-grey tonality is characteristic of Adriaen's earlier works which later shift to a palette of warmer green-browns.