*This site is is best viewed on a PC or laptop.

 

Gerrit Dou

1613-1675 Holland/Baroque

 

Brief Biography-Gerard (Gerhard, Gerrit) Dou from Leyden acquired his initial skills from Bartholomew Dolendo, an engraver who taught him drawing and Peter Kouwhoorn, who painted glass and assisted his father, who was a glazier. At fifteen, Rembrandtadmitted him into his atelier from 1628 to 1631. He collaborated with Rembrandt and other artists, such as Nicolaes Berchem, who did the landscape in his painting, the Portrait Group, now in the Rijksmuseum. His attention to fine detail was so unique that it deterred sitters due to Dou’s time to paint a single hand. However, this commitment to precision and chiaroscuro achieved considerable success, moving from portraits to interior scenes. Arnold Houbraken states that his patron Mr Spiering granted him one thousand guilders a year for the first choice of his works plus additional unit fees. Joachim von Sandrart, on the other hand, assures us the benefactor could receive all paintings yearned for that fee. He co-founded the Leyden Guild of Saint Luke with Jan Steen, and founded the Fijnschilders (Fine Painters), who inclined toward classicism. His most notable students were Gabriel Metsu, Pieter Cornelisz van Slingelandt, Frans van Mieris and Godfried Schalcken.

 

Click an Image to Enlarge

young woman at
her toilet

young woman at her toilet


a scholar

a scholar

a woman playing
a clavichord

a woman playing a clavichord

couple in a
landscape

couple in a landscape


dutch housewife

dutch housewife


dutch interior

dutch interior


chopping onions

chopping onions


maid at the window

maid at the window


night school

night school


portrait of a woman

portrait of a woman


praying hermit

praying hermit

scholar sharpening
a quill pen

scholar sharpening a quill pen


self portrait

self portrait

soldier of the leiden
civic guard

soldier of the leiden civic guard


extraction of tooth

extraction of tooth


moneylender

moneylender


physician

physician


young mother

young mother

trumpet player in
front of a banquet

trumpet-player in front of a banquet


violinist

violinist

woman eating
porridge

woman eating porridge


the quack doctor

the quack doctor


woman in a black

woman in a black#