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Gerrit Dou (7 April 1613 – 9 February 1675), also known as Gerard Douw or Dow, was a Dutch Golden Age painter, whose small, highly polished paintings are typical of the
Dou was born in 
Notwithstanding the minuteness of his touch, the general effect was harmonious and free from stiffness, and his colour was always fresh and transparent. He often represented subjects in lantern or candle light, the effects of which he reproduced with an unparalleled fidelity and skill. He often painted with the aid of a concave lens combined with a convex mirror (the former sharpening perception, the latter providing a rightway-up image to paint from), and to obtain exactness looked at his subject through a frame crossed with squares of silk thread. His practice as a portrait painter, which was at first considerable, gradually declined, sitters being unwilling to give him the time that he deemed necessary. His pictures were always small in size. More than 200 are attributed to him, and examples are to be found in most of the major public collections of Europe. His ''chef-d'oeuvre'' is generally considered to be ''
File:Self-portrait by Gerrit Dou.jpg, ''Self-portrait'', 1635–1638, Cheltenham Art Gallery and Museum
File:Gerard Dou - Painter in his Studio - WGA06642.jpg, ''The Painter in his Studio'', 1647 Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister
File:Gerard Dou - Self-Portrait - WGA06660.jpg, ''Self-portrait'', c. 1650, Rijksmuseum Amsterdam
File:Gérard Dou.jpg, ''Self-Portrait'' c. 1665 Louvre
The paragone debate is not only addressed in writings from that time but is also reflected in the subject matter of several of Dou’s paintings. An example of this is the ''Old Painter at work'', in which an old painter is shown working on a canvas behind a table displaying objects that show his capabilities of imitation. The aged painter refers to an argument in the paragone debate that a painter can achieve his best work at an old age, while a sculptor cannot because of the physical demands of sculpting. On the table, a sculptured head and a printed book are rendered in a lifelike fashion to show that painting can imitate both sculpture and printed paper, thereby reinforcing the notion that painting trumps sculpture. According to Sluijter, the "amazing true-to-life peacock and a beautiful Triton shell, next to a copper pot with the most refined reflections of light" show that art beats nature. Sluijter argues that the peacock stands for the ability of painting to "preserve the transient works of nature thereby even surpassing it". luijter, 2000
Difficulties arise when an artist wants to associate a certain meaning with a specific object. One of the most troublesome and thus one of the most instructive objects in Dou’s oeuvre is a relief by François Duquesnoy called ''Putti Teasing a Goat''. This relief features in many of Dou’s pictures with a window-sill motif, and has been assigned various meanings. J. A. Emmens, for example, states that in ''The Trumpeter'' the relief represents "the deceitfulness of human desires, because the goat, personifying lust, can time and again be deceived by appearance, by the deceptive imitation, which is the mask". mmens, Opstellen, cit. (note 4), vol. 2, p 183 in Hecht, 2002
''The Kitchen Maid with a Boy in a Window'' features a maidservant, fish and a little boy holding a hare, cramped together with a bunch of vegetables, a dead bird and copperware. Sluijter acknowledges that a contemporary viewer would have certainly approved of this scene as representing an approximation of life since the rendering of all the material is very realistic. On the overall series of maidservant-scenes, Sluijter remarks that the image of a maidservant was generally associated with a sexual undertone. According to de Jongh, this motif has erotic references. In his article on Erotica in 17th-century genre pieces, de Jongh argues that dead hunted birds and animals most likely all refer to the notion of eroticism and availability of the woman depicted because birding and hunting were synonyms for sexual encounters. All images of maidservants accompanied by dead birds or animals refer to hunting and ''vogelen'' (birding), which in Dutch means to copulate. The maidservants are thereby explicitly erotic. Certainly, a cock as a bird refers to a cock as the male sex organ and this can be seen hanging from the wall in ''Kitchen Maid with a Boy in a Window''. e Jongh, 1968–1969De Jongh´s erotic interpretations can be disputed regarding the paintings by Gerard Dou because he depicts his dead chicks and furry hares not only with seductive maidservants but also as props in motifs with old servants, or in domestic household scenes, such as '' The Young Mother'' (1658).
Additionally, to objects possibly having a deeper meaning via
*''The Night School'' ( Rijksmuseum,
File:Gerrit Dou - De Hollandse huisvrouw.jpg, ''Dutch Housewife'', 1650,
Gerrit Dou (1613–1675): Master Painter in the Age of Rembrandt at the National Gallery of Art
Works and literature
Oldandsold.com
Vermeer and The Delft School
a full text exhibition catalog from The Metropolitan Museum of Art, which has material on Gerrit Dou {{DEFAULTSORT:Dou, Gerard 1613 births 1675 deaths Dutch Golden Age painters Dutch male painters Trompe-l'œil artists Artists from Leiden Burials at Pieterskerk, Leiden Pupils of Rembrandt
Leiden fijnschilder {{Short description, 17th-century Dutch artistic movement
The Fijnschilders (literally "fine-painters"), also called the Leiden Fijnschilders ('Leidse Fijnschilders'), were Dutch Golden Age painters who, from about 1630 to 1710, strove to create a ...
s. He specialised in genre scenes and is noted for his ''trompe-l'œil
''Trompe-l'œil'' ( , ; ) is an artistic term for the highly realistic optical illusion of three-dimensional space and objects on a two-dimensional surface. ''Trompe l'oeil'', which is most often associated with painting, tricks the viewer into ...
'' "niche" paintings and candlelit night-scenes with strong chiaroscuro. He was a student of Rembrandt
Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn (, ; 15 July 1606 – 4 October 1669), usually simply known as Rembrandt, was a Dutch Golden Age painter, printmaker and draughtsman. An innovative and prolific master in three media, he is generally co ...
.
Life
Dou was born in Leiden
Leiden (; in English and archaic Dutch also Leyden) is a city and municipality in the province of South Holland, Netherlands. The municipality of Leiden has a population of 119,713, but the city forms one densely connected agglomeration wit ...
, where his father was a manufacturer of stained-glass.Baer, p.28 He studied drawing under Bartholomeus Dolendo, and then trained in the stained-glass workshop of Pieter Couwenhorn. In February 1628, at the age of fourteen, his father sent him to study painting in the studio of Rembrandt
Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn (, ; 15 July 1606 – 4 October 1669), usually simply known as Rembrandt, was a Dutch Golden Age painter, printmaker and draughtsman. An innovative and prolific master in three media, he is generally co ...
(then aged about 21) who lived nearby. From Rembrandt, with whom he remained for about three years, he acquired his skill in colouring and in the more subtle effects of chiaroscuro, and his master's style is reflected in several of his earlier pictures, notably a self-portrait at the age of 22 in the Bridgewater Collection, and in the ''Blind Tobit going to meet his Son'', at Wardour Castle
Wardour Castle is a ruined 14th-century castle at Wardour, on the boundaries of the civil parishes of Tisbury and Donhead St Andrew in the English county of Wiltshire, about west of Salisbury. The castle was built in the 1390s, came into the ...
ocations may be outdated''Encyclopaedia Britannica'' 1911
At a comparatively early point in his career, however, he developed a distinctive manner of his own which diverged considerably from Rembrandt's, cultivating a minute and elaborate style of treatment. He is said to have spent five days in painting a hand, and his work was so fine that he found it necessary to manufacture his own brushes.
Notwithstanding the minuteness of his touch, the general effect was harmonious and free from stiffness, and his colour was always fresh and transparent. He often represented subjects in lantern or candle light, the effects of which he reproduced with an unparalleled fidelity and skill. He often painted with the aid of a concave lens combined with a convex mirror (the former sharpening perception, the latter providing a rightway-up image to paint from), and to obtain exactness looked at his subject through a frame crossed with squares of silk thread. His practice as a portrait painter, which was at first considerable, gradually declined, sitters being unwilling to give him the time that he deemed necessary. His pictures were always small in size. More than 200 are attributed to him, and examples are to be found in most of the major public collections of Europe. His ''chef-d'oeuvre'' is generally considered to be ''The Dropsical Woman
''The Woman with Dropsy'' or ''The Dropsical Woman'' is an oil on canvas painting by Dutch artist Gerrit Dou, created ''c.'' 1663. It shows a woman suffering from edema and is considered as one of Dou's masterpieces.
Previously in Charles Emman ...
'' (1663), and '' The Dutch Housewife'' (1650), both in the 
Louvre
The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is the world's most-visited museum, and an historic landmark in Paris, France. It is the home of some of the best-known works of art, including the ''Mona Lisa'' and the ''Venus de Milo''. A central l ...
. The ''Evening School'', in the Amsterdam Rijksmuseum, is the best example of the candlelight scenes in which he excelled. In the National Gallery, London
The National Gallery is an art museum in Trafalgar Square in the City of Westminster, in Central London, England. Founded in 1824, it houses a collection of over 2,300 paintings dating from the mid-13th century to 1900. The current Director o ...
, favorable specimens are to be seen in the '' Poulterer's Shop'' (1672), and a self-portrait (see above). Dou's pictures brought high prices, and one patron, Pieter Spiering, who acted as Swedish Ambassador in The Hague from the mid-1630s, paid him 500 guilders annually simply for the right of first refusal of his latest works. Queen Christina of Sweden owned eleven paintings by Dou, and Cosimo III de' Medici visited his house, where he may have bought at least one of the works now in the Uffizi. The Dutch royal court itself, however, preferred work of a more classical tendency.
Dou died in Leiden. His most noted pupils were Frans van Mieris the Elder and Gabriël Metsu. He also taught Bartholomeus Maton, Carel de Moor, Matthijs Naiveu, Abraham de Pape, Godfried Schalcken, Pieter Cornelisz van Slingelandt, Domenicus van Tol, Gijsbert Andriesz Verbrugge, and Pieter Hermansz Verelst.
Interpretation
A considerable amount was written about Dou in his own lifetime; for instance, Philips Angels praises Dou in his ''Lof der Schilderkunst'' for his imitation of nature and his visual illusions. Angels also stresses how Dou’s paintings expressed the paragone debate current around that time. The debate was an ongoing competition between painting, sculpture and poetry as to which was the best representation of nature. It was especially popular in Leiden where the painters were seeking to obtain the rights of a guild from the town council in order to have laws for their economic protection.
The paragone debate is not only addressed in writings from that time but is also reflected in the subject matter of several of Dou’s paintings. An example of this is the ''Old Painter at work'', in which an old painter is shown working on a canvas behind a table displaying objects that show his capabilities of imitation. The aged painter refers to an argument in the paragone debate that a painter can achieve his best work at an old age, while a sculptor cannot because of the physical demands of sculpting. On the table, a sculptured head and a printed book are rendered in a lifelike fashion to show that painting can imitate both sculpture and printed paper, thereby reinforcing the notion that painting trumps sculpture. According to Sluijter, the "amazing true-to-life peacock and a beautiful Triton shell, next to a copper pot with the most refined reflections of light" show that art beats nature. Sluijter argues that the peacock stands for the ability of painting to "preserve the transient works of nature thereby even surpassing it". luijter, 2000
Difficulties arise when an artist wants to associate a certain meaning with a specific object. One of the most troublesome and thus one of the most instructive objects in Dou’s oeuvre is a relief by François Duquesnoy called ''Putti Teasing a Goat''. This relief features in many of Dou’s pictures with a window-sill motif, and has been assigned various meanings. J. A. Emmens, for example, states that in ''The Trumpeter'' the relief represents "the deceitfulness of human desires, because the goat, personifying lust, can time and again be deceived by appearance, by the deceptive imitation, which is the mask". mmens, Opstellen, cit. (note 4), vol. 2, p 183 in Hecht, 2002
''The Kitchen Maid with a Boy in a Window'' features a maidservant, fish and a little boy holding a hare, cramped together with a bunch of vegetables, a dead bird and copperware. Sluijter acknowledges that a contemporary viewer would have certainly approved of this scene as representing an approximation of life since the rendering of all the material is very realistic. On the overall series of maidservant-scenes, Sluijter remarks that the image of a maidservant was generally associated with a sexual undertone. According to de Jongh, this motif has erotic references. In his article on Erotica in 17th-century genre pieces, de Jongh argues that dead hunted birds and animals most likely all refer to the notion of eroticism and availability of the woman depicted because birding and hunting were synonyms for sexual encounters. All images of maidservants accompanied by dead birds or animals refer to hunting and ''vogelen'' (birding), which in Dutch means to copulate. The maidservants are thereby explicitly erotic. Certainly, a cock as a bird refers to a cock as the male sex organ and this can be seen hanging from the wall in ''Kitchen Maid with a Boy in a Window''. e Jongh, 1968–1969De Jongh´s erotic interpretations can be disputed regarding the paintings by Gerard Dou because he depicts his dead chicks and furry hares not only with seductive maidservants but also as props in motifs with old servants, or in domestic household scenes, such as '' The Young Mother'' (1658).
Additionally, to objects possibly having a deeper meaning via emblem book
An emblem book is a book collecting emblems (allegorical illustrations) with accompanying explanatory text, typically morals or poems. This category of books was popular in Europe during the 16th and 17th centuries.
Emblem books are collection ...
s, complete scenes in Dou’s oeuvre have been related to scenes depicted in emblem books or prints. The ''Girl Pouring Water'' is a variation of the theme ''Educatio prima bona sit'' from Boissards ''Vesuntini emblemata''. This emblem depicts the moral that "children absorb knowledge like a pot absorbs water". The gaining of knowledge is represented by a little boy standing in the background while the water is poured in the foreground. ollander, 2002
One painting that is strongly associated with an emblem is the ''Night School''. This particular painting is rather anecdotal in character. Baer disagrees with Hecht who refers to this painting as being merely a demonstration of Dou’s abilities to work with artificial light. Baer identifies the candle lights with the light of understanding, and she relates the unlit lantern on the left wall with ignorance, which is combated by teaching, represented by the lit lantern in the middle of the floor. Additionally, Baer suggests that the girl at the left is a representation of Cognitione because she strikes the same pose as in Cesare Ripa’s ''Iconologia''. Like Ripa’s emblem, the girl in Dou’s painting holds a candle while pointing towards a line of text. The essence of Ripa’s emblem is that “like our eyes, which need light to see, so our reason needs our senses, especially that of sight, to achieve true understanding”. aer, 2001Posthumous reputation
Dou's work commanded high prices long after his death, until the 1860s. Soon after, he fell into near complete obscurity.Johnson, Paul. ''Art: A New History'', Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2003. For example, when the Metropolitan Museum of Art held in an exhibit to introduce Dutch art, it featured 37 by Rembrandt, 20 by Hals, but none by Dou. His obscurity continued until the 1970s when his reputation was reestablished and has continued since.Works
*''The Night School'' ( Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam
Amsterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Amstel'') is the Capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, most populous city of the Netherlands, with The Hague being the seat of government. It has a population ...
)
*1628: ''Astronomer'' ( Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...
)
*1631.1632 '' Old Woman Reading'' (formerly known as ''Rembrandt's Mother'') (Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam)
*1630s: ''Portrait of a Girl'' ( Manchester Art Gallery, UK)
*1631: ''Prince Rupert'' ( J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the wor ...
)
*1635–1636: ''Still Life with a Boy Blowing Soap-Bubbles'' (National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo
Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and List of cities in Japan, largest city of Japan. Formerly known as Edo, its metropolitan area () is the most populous in the world, ...
)
*1635–1640: ''Portrait of a Man'' (National Gallery, London)
*1637: ''An Interior with a Young Violinist'' ( National Galleries of Scotland)
*1640s: ''Portrait of a Young Woman'' (National Gallery, London)
*1640–1645: ''Portrait of a Man'' (Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg)
*1642–1647: ''St. Jerome in the Desert'' (Memorial Art Gallery of the University of Rochester, New York)
*1645: ''The Schoolmaster'' ( Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge
Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge beca ...
)
*1646: ''Girl Chopping Onions'' ( Royal Collection, London)
*1647: ''Still Life With Book and Purse'' (J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles)
*1650: ''The Dutch Housewife'' (Louvre, Paris)
*1650s: ''The Young Mother'' ( Gemäldegalerie, Berlin
Berlin is Capital of Germany, the capital and largest city of Germany, both by area and List of cities in Germany by population, by population. Its more than 3.85 million inhabitants make it the European Union's List of cities in the European U ...
)
*1650s: ''Self Portrait'' (Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam)
*1650s: ''Self-portrait at the Window'' ( Residenzgalerie, Salzburg
Salzburg (, ; literally "Salt-Castle"; bar, Soizbuag, label=Austro-Bavarian) is the fourth-largest city in Austria. In 2020, it had a population of 156,872.
The town is on the site of the Roman settlement of ''Iuvavum''. Salzburg was founded ...
)
*1658-1665: ''Young Woman with a Lighted Candle at a Window'' ( Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum, Madrid
Madrid ( , ) is the capital and most populous city of Spain. The city has almost 3.4 million inhabitants and a metropolitan area population of approximately 6.7 million. It is the second-largest city in the European Union (EU), an ...
)
*1652: ''The Quack Doctor
''The Quack Doctor'' is an oil on panel painting by the Dutch artist Gerrit Dou from 1652. It is held at the Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, in Rotterdam.
Description and analysis
It depicts a crowd gathered around a quack doctor as he promote ...
'' ( Museum Boymans-van Beuningen, Rotterdam
Rotterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Rotte'') is the second largest city and municipality in the Netherlands. It is in the province of South Holland, part of the North Sea mouth of the Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta, via the ''"N ...
)
*1653:'' The Physician'' ( Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetu, Christchurch, New Zealand)
*1653: ''The Violin Player'' (Liechtenstein Palace, Vienna
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, utc_offset = +1
, timezone_DST ...
)
*1655: ''Old Woman Cutting Bread'' ( Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the capital city, state capital and List of municipalities in Massachusetts, most populous city of the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financ ...
)
*1655: ''Astronomer by Candlelight'' (J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles)
*1658: '' The Young Mother'' ( Mauritshuis, The Hague
The Hague ( ; nl, Den Haag or ) is a list of cities in the Netherlands by province, city and municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality of the Netherlands, situated on the west coast facing the North Sea. The Hague is the country's ad ...
)
*1660–1665: ''Dentist by Candlelight'' (Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth)
*1660–1665: ''Old Woman Unreeling Threads'' (Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg)
*1660–1665: ''Soldier Bather'' (Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg)
*1660-1665: ''Woman Bather'' (Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg)
*1660-1665: ''Self-portrait'' (Louvre, Paris)
*1661: '' A Hermit'' (Wallace Collection
The Wallace Collection is a museum in London occupying Hertford House in Manchester Square, the former townhouse of the Seymour family, Marquesses of Hertford. It is named after Sir Richard Wallace, who built the extensive collection, along ...
, London)
*1663: ''The Dropsical Woman
''The Woman with Dropsy'' or ''The Dropsical Woman'' is an oil on canvas painting by Dutch artist Gerrit Dou, created ''c.'' 1663. It shows a woman suffering from edema and is considered as one of Dou's masterpieces.
Previously in Charles Emman ...
'' (Louvre, Paris)
*1663: ''Woman at a Window with a Copper Bowl of Apples and a Cock Pheasant'' (Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge)
*1665: ''A Lady playing a Clavichord'' ( Dulwich Picture Gallery, London
London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...
)
*1670: ''A Hermit Praying'' ( Minneapolis Institute of Arts, Minnesota
Minnesota () is a state in the upper midwestern region of the United States. It is the 12th largest U.S. state in area and the List of U.S. states and territories by population, 22nd most populous, with over 5.75 million residents. Minne ...
)
*1670: ''The Hermit'' (National Gallery of Art
The National Gallery of Art, and its attached Sculpture Garden, is a national art museum in Washington, D.C., United States, located on the National Mall, between 3rd and 9th Streets, at Constitution Avenue NW. Open to the public and free of ch ...
, Washington, D.C.)
*1670s: ''A Poulterer's Shop'' (National Gallery, London)
*1670–75: ''The Herring Seller'' (Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg)
*''Self Portrait'' (National Gallery, London)
*''Portrait of a Young Man'' (Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge)
*''Evening Light'' (Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam)
*''Young Man'' (The Hague)
*''The Cook'' (Louvre, Paris)
*''The Spinner'' (Gala-Salvador Dalí
Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dalí i Domènech, Marquess of Dalí of Púbol (; ; ; 11 May 190423 January 1989) was a Spanish surrealist artist renowned for his technical skill, precise draftsmanship, and the striking and bizarre images in ...
Foundation)
*''The Spinning Reel'' ( Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco)
*''The Reader'' (Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco)
*''Portrait of an Unknown Gentleman'' (Museum of Fine Arts at the University of Montana, Missoula)
*''Dog at Rest'' (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)
Louvre
The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is the world's most-visited museum, and an historic landmark in Paris, France. It is the home of some of the best-known works of art, including the ''Mona Lisa'' and the ''Venus de Milo''. A central l ...
File:Gerard Dou - The Grocer's Shop - WGA06636.jpg, ''The Grocer's Shop'', 1647, Louvre
The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is the world's most-visited museum, and an historic landmark in Paris, France. It is the home of some of the best-known works of art, including the ''Mona Lisa'' and the ''Venus de Milo''. A central l ...
File:Gerard Dou - Reading the Bible - WGA06644.jpg, ''Reading the Bible'', circa 1645, Louvre
The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is the world's most-visited museum, and an historic landmark in Paris, France. It is the home of some of the best-known works of art, including the ''Mona Lisa'' and the ''Venus de Milo''. A central l ...
File:Gerard Dou 006.jpg, '' The Young Mother'', 1658, Mauritshuis
File:Gerard Dou - Violon Player - WGA06663.jpg, ''Violon Player'', 1653, Liechtenstein Museum
File:The Doctor 1653 Gerard Dou.jpg, '' The Physician'', 1653, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Wien
File:Gerrit Dou, Haringverkoopster met jongen.jpg, ''Haringverkoopster met jongen'', 1664, Leiden Collection
Thomas Scott Kaplan (born September 14, 1962) is an American billionaire businessman, philanthropist and art collector. Kaplan is the world's largest private collector of Rembrandt's works.
Kaplan is the chairman and chief investment officer of ...
File:Gerard Dou - Woman Peeling Carrot - WGA06634.jpg, ''Woman Peeling Carrot''
File:Een kluizenaar Rijksmuseum SK-C-128.jpeg, ''Hermit'' 1664, Rijksmuseum
File:Gerard Dou - Girl with a Candle at a Window 1930.21 joven-ventana-vela.jpg, ''Girl with a Candle at a Window'', between 1658 and 1665, Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum, Madrid.
File:Gerard Dou- Woman Eating Porridge-1637.jpg, ''Woman Eating Porridge'', ca. 1632–1637, Private Collection
File:Gerrit Dou - Scholar sharpening a quill pen.jpg, ''Scholar sharpening a quill pen'', 1633, Leiden Collection
Thomas Scott Kaplan (born September 14, 1962) is an American billionaire businessman, philanthropist and art collector. Kaplan is the world's largest private collector of Rembrandt's works.
Kaplan is the chairman and chief investment officer of ...
File:Dou Stilleben.JPG, ''Still life'', circa 1660, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden
File:Gerard Dou 008.jpg, ''A Young Woman at her Toilet'', 1667, Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen
Municipal Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen () is an art museum in Rotterdam in the Netherlands. The name of the museum is derived from the two most important collectors of Frans Jacob Otto Boijmans and Daniël George van Beuningen. It is located ...
File:Gerard Dou - The Moneylender - WGA06649.jpg, ''The Moneylender'', circa 1664, Louvre
The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is the world's most-visited museum, and an historic landmark in Paris, France. It is the home of some of the best-known works of art, including the ''Mona Lisa'' and the ''Venus de Milo''. A central l ...
File:Gerard Dou - The Silver Ewer - WGA06648.jpg, ''The Silver Ewer'' circa 1663, Louvre
The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is the world's most-visited museum, and an historic landmark in Paris, France. It is the home of some of the best-known works of art, including the ''Mona Lisa'' and the ''Venus de Milo''. A central l ...
File:Gerard Dou - Woman Pouring Water into a Jar - WGA06645.jpg, ''Woman Pouring Water into a Jar'', from 1655 until 1665, Louvre
The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is the world's most-visited museum, and an historic landmark in Paris, France. It is the home of some of the best-known works of art, including the ''Mona Lisa'' and the ''Venus de Milo''. A central l ...
File:Dou Old Woman Cutting Bread.png, ''Old Woman Cutting Bread'', about 1655, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Cultural references
InHonoré de Balzac
Honoré de Balzac ( , more commonly , ; born Honoré Balzac;Jean-Louis Dega, La vie prodigieuse de Bernard-François Balssa, père d'Honoré de Balzac : Aux sources historiques de La Comédie humaine, Rodez, Subervie, 1998, 665 p. 20 May 179 ...
's 1831 novel ''La Peau de chagrin
''La Peau de chagrin'' (, ''The Skin of Shagreen''), known in English as ''The Magic Skin and The Wild Ass's Skin'', is an 1831 novel by French novelist and playwright Honoré de Balzac (1799–1850). Set in early 19th-century Paris, it tells t ...
'', the curiosity shop Raphaël de Valentin enters in the opening sequence contains, among other paintings, "a Gerald Dow which resembled a page of Sterne," and the old shopkeeper is compared to "Gerald Dow's ''Money-Changer''."
In the comic opera
Comic opera, sometimes known as light opera, is a sung dramatic work of a light or comic nature, usually with a happy ending and often including spoken dialogue.
Forms of comic opera first developed in late 17th-century Italy. By the 1730s, a n ...
'' The Pirates of Penzance'', by Gilbert and Sullivan
Gilbert and Sullivan was a Victorian-era theatrical partnership of the dramatist W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) and the composer Arthur Sullivan (1842–1900), who jointly created fourteen comic operas between 1871 and 1896, of which '' H.M.S. ...
, the Major-General brags of being able to distinguish works by Raphael
Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino, better known as Raphael (; or ; March 28 or April 6, 1483April 6, 1520), was an Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance. His work is admired for its clarity of form, ease of composition, and visual ...
from works by Dou and Johan Zoffany.
Dou (as "Gerard Douw") is a character in J. Sheridan Le Fanu's short story "Schalken the Painter". In the 1979 BBC television adaptation of this work, '' Schalcken the Painter'', he was played by Maurice Denham.
Dou is portrayed on film by Toby Jones in '' Nightwatching'' (2007).
W. F. Harvey's short story "Old Masters" features a picture by Dou (as Gerhard Dow) as the subject of an ingenious scam. (The story is included in the 2009 Wordsworth Edition omnibus collection of Harvey's stories, "The Beast with Five Fingers".)
A group of boys in Mary Mapes Dodge's ''Hans Brinker or the Silver Skates'' visit a museum in Amsterdam and see two paintings by "Gerard Douw"--"The Hermit" and "Evening School."
References
Sources
* *Gerrit Dou (1613–1675): Master Painter in the Age of Rembrandt at the National Gallery of Art
External links
*Works and literature
Oldandsold.com
Vermeer and The Delft School
a full text exhibition catalog from The Metropolitan Museum of Art, which has material on Gerrit Dou {{DEFAULTSORT:Dou, Gerard 1613 births 1675 deaths Dutch Golden Age painters Dutch male painters Trompe-l'œil artists Artists from Leiden Burials at Pieterskerk, Leiden Pupils of Rembrandt