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Year 1633 (MDCXXXIII) was a common year starting on Saturday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar and a common year starting on Tuesday of the 10-day slower Julian calendar.

Events[link]

January–June[link]

• February 13 – Galileo Galilei arrives in Rome for his trial before the Inquisition.
• March 1 – Samuel de Champlain reclaims his role as commander of New France on behalf of Cardinal Richelieu.
• April 12 – Galileo Galilei convicted of heresy by the Roman Catholic church ^[1]
• June 22 – The Roman Catholic church forces Galileo Galilei to recant his heliocentric view of the solar system: Eppur si muove (Italian) (Which, in fact, he did not say).

July–December[link]

• October 22 – A Ming dynasty fleet under Zheng Zhilong beat a Dutch East India Company fleet at the island of Quemoy.

Date unknown[link]

• The Jews of Poznań are granted the privilege of forbidding Christians to enter into their city quarter.
• In Ethiopia, the Emperor Fasilides expels the Jesuit missionaries.
• Shogun Tokugawa Iemitsu of Japan outlaws Christianity and begins a policy of extreme isolationism.
• Mission San Luis de Apalachee is built in the New World by two Spanish friars.
• A professorship in Arabic studies is founded at Cambridge University.

Births[link]

• February 20 – Jan de Baen, Dutch portrait painter (d. 1702)
• February 23 – Samuel Pepys, English civil servant and diarist (d. 1703)
• April – Willem Drost, Dutch painter and printmaker (d. 1659)
• April 20 – Emperor Go-Komyo of Japan (d. 1654)
• June 1 – Geminiano Montanari, Italian astronomer (d. 1687)
• June 16 – Jean de Thévenot, French traveler and scientist (d. 1667)
• June 19 – Philipp van Limborch, Dutch Protestant theologian (d. 1712)
• July 1 – Johann Heinrich Heidegger, Swiss theologian (d. 1698)
• September 8 – Ferdinand IV of Germany (d. 1654)
• October 14 – King James II of England and Ireland/King James VII of Scotland (d. 1701)
• November 3 – Bernardino Ramazzini, Italian physician (d. 1714)
• November 11 – George Savile, 1st Marquess of Halifax, English writer and statesman (d. 1695)
• date unknown – Sir Edward Seymour, 4th Baronet, politician (d. 1708)

Deaths[link]

• March 1 – George Herbert, English poet and orator (b. 1593)
• June – Etienne Brule, French explorer (b. c. 1592)
• July 22 – Trijntje Keever, presumed to have been the tallest woman ever (b. 1616)
• August 5 – Archbishop George Abbot, Archbishop of Canterbury (b. 1562)
• August 10 – Anthony Munday, English writer (b. 1553)
• August 12 – Jacopo Peri, Italian composer (b. 1561)
• September – Henry Cary, 1st Viscount Falkland (b. c. 1575)
• October 25 – Jean Titelouze, French organist (b. c.1562)
• October 26 – Horio Tadaharu, Japanese warlord (b. 1596)
• November 7 – Cornelius Drebbel, Dutch inventor (b. 1572)
• November 14 – William Ames, English philosopher (b. 1576)
• December 1 – Infanta Isabella Clara Eugenia of Spain (b. 1566)
• December 17 – Meletius Smotrytsky, Ruthenian religious activist and author (b. 1577)
• date unknown – Xu Guangqi, Chinese scientist and mathematician (b. 1562)

References[link]

This article includes a list of references, but its sources remain unclear because it has insufficient inline citations. Please help to improve this article by introducing more precise citations. (November 2011)

Frans Hals
Copy of a self-portrait by Frans Hals.
Birth name	Frans Hals
Born	c. 1580 Antwerp
Died	26 August 1666 (aged 85–86) Haarlem
Nationality	Flemish - Dutch
Field	Painting
Works	Gipsy Girl, 1628-30 Laughing Cavalier

Frans Hals the Elder (c. 1580 – 26 August 1666) was a Dutch Golden Age painter. He is notable for his loose painterly brushwork, and helped introduce this lively style of painting into Dutch art. Hals was also instrumental in the evolution of 17th century group portraiture.

Biography[link]

Hals was born in 1580 or 1581, in Antwerp. Like many, Hals' family fled during the Fall of Antwerp (1584-1585) from the Spanish Netherlands to Haarlem, where he lived for the remainder of his life. Hals studied under another Flemish-émigré, Karel van Mander (1548–1606), whose Mannerist influence, however, is not noticeably visible in his work. At the age of 27, he became a member of the city's painter's corporation, the Haarlem Guild of Saint Luke, and he started to earn money as an art restorer for the city council. He worked on their large art collection that Karel van Mander had described in his book The Painting-Book (Middle Dutch: Het Schilder-Boeck), published in 1604. The most notable of these were the works of Geertgen tot Sint Jans, Jan van Scorel and Jan Mostaert, that hung in de St. Jans kerk in Haarlem. The restoration work was paid for by the city of Haarlem, since all religious art was confiscated after the iconoclasm, but the entire collection of paintings was not formally possessed by the city council until 1625, after the city fathers had decided which paintings were suitable for the city hall. The remaining art that was considered too "Roman Catholic" was sold to Cornelis Claesz van Wieringen, a fellow guild member, on the grounds that he remove it from the city. It was under these circumstances that Hals began his career in portraiture, since the market for religious themes had disappeared.

The earliest known example of Hals' own art is the 1611, Jacobus Zaffius. His 'breakthrough' came in 1616, with the life-size group portrait, The Banquet of the Officers of the St George Militia Company. His most noted portrait today is the one he made in 1649 of René Descartes.

Statue of Frans Hals in Florapark, Haarlem

Historians have erroneously reported that he mistreated his first wife, Anneke Hermansz (Annetje Harmensdochter Abeel), based on records that a Frans Hals was charged with spousal abuse in Haarlem in 1616. However, as Seymour Slive has pointed out, the Frans Hals in question was not the artist, but another Haarlem resident of the same name. Indeed, at the time of these charges, the artist had no wife to mistreat as Anneke had died during labor earlier in 1616. Similarly, historical accounts of Hals' propensity for drink have been largely based on embellished anecdotes of his early biographers, namely Arnold Houbraken, with no direct evidence existing documenting such. In 1617, he married Lysbeth Reyniers, the young daughter of a fishmonger that he had taken in to look after his two children. They married in Spaarndam, a small village outside the banns of Haarlem, because she was already 8 months pregnant. Frans Hals was a devoted father and they went on to have eight children.^[1] Where Hals contemporaries such as Rembrandt moved their households according to the caprices of patrons, Hals remained in Haarlem and insisted that his customers came to him. According to the Haarlem archives, a militia piece that Hals started in Amsterdam was finished by another painter because Hals refused to paint in Amsterdam, insisting that the militiamen come to Haarlem to sit for their portraits.

Although Hals' work was in demand throughout his life, he lived so long that he eventually went out of style as a painter and experienced financial difficulties. In addition to his painting, he continued throughout his life to work as an restorer, art dealer, and art tax expert for the city councilors. His creditors took him to court several times, and to settle his debt with a baker in 1652 he sold his belongings. The inventory of the property seized mentions only three mattresses and bolsters, an armoire, a table and five pictures (these were by himself, his sons, van Mander, and Maarten van Heemskerck). Left destitute, the municipality gave him an annuity of 200 florins in 1664.

At a time when the Dutch nation fought for independence, Hals appeared in the ranks of the schutterij, a military guild. This fact found in the Haarlem archives has led to speculation that Hals made a self portrait in his 1639 painting of the St. Joris company, though this has never been confirmed. It was not normal for mere members to be painted, that privilege was reserved only for the officers. It is possible that he received the privilege as thanks for painting that company 3 times. Hals was also a member of a local chamber of rhetoric, and in 1644 chairman of the Painters Corporation at Haarlem.

Frans Hals died in Haarlem in 1666 and was buried in the city's St. Bavo Church. His widow later died obscurely in a hospital after seeking outdoor relief from the guardians of the poor.

Artistic career[link]

Frans Hals, later finished by Pieter Codde. De Magere Compagnie. 1637. Oil on canvas, 209 x 429 cm, Rijksmuseum Amsterdam

Hals is best known for his portraits, mainly of wealthy citizens, like Pieter van den Broecke and Isaac Massa, whom he painted three times. He also painted large group portraits, many of which showed civil guards. He was a Baroque painter who practiced an intimate realism with a radically free approach. His pictures illustrate the various strata of society; banquets or meetings of officers, sharpshooters, guildsmen, admirals, generals, burgomasters, merchants, lawyers, and clerks, itinerant players and singers, gentlefolk, fishwives and tavern heroes.

In group portraits, such as the Archers of St. Hadrian, Hals captures each character in a different manner. The faces are not idealized and are clearly distinguishable, with their personalities revealed in a variety of poses and facial expressions.

He studied under the painter and historian Karel van Mander (Hals owned some paintings by van Mander that were amongst the items sold to pay his bakery debt in 1652).

Hals was fond of daylight and silvery sheen, while Rembrandt used golden glow effects based upon artificial contrasts of low light in immeasurable gloom. Both men were painters of touch, but of touch on different keys — Rembrandt was the bass, Hals the treble. Hals seized, with rare intuition, a moment in the life of his subjects. What nature displayed in that moment he reproduced thoroughly in a delicate scale of color, and with mastery over every form of expression. He became so clever that exact tone, light and shade, and modeling were obtained with a few marked and fluid strokes of the brush. He became a popular portrait painter, and painted the wealthy of Haarlem on special occasions. He won many commissions for wedding portraits (the husband is traditionally situated on the left, and the wife situated on the right):

Gallery[link]

• 

  Portrait of Jacob Olycan (1596-1638), 1625, Mauritshuis.

• 

  Portrait of Aletta Hanemans (1606-1653), bride of Jacob Olycan, 1625, Mauritshuis.

• 

  Paulus Beresteyn, 1629, Louvre.

• 

  Catharina Both van der Eem, bride of Paulus Beresteyn, 1629, Louvre.

• 

  Joseph Coymans (1591-1660), the husband of Dorothea Berck, 1644, Wadsworth Atheneum.

• 

  Dorothea Berck (1593-1684), wife of Joseph Coymans, 1644, Private Collection.

• 

  Portrait of Stephan Geraedts, husband of Isabella Coymans, 1652,Royal Museum of Fine Arts, Antwerp.

• 

  Isabella Coymans, wife of Stephan Geraedts, 1652, Private Collection.

The only record of his work in the first decade of his independent activity is an engraving by Jan van de Velde copied from the lost portrait of The Minister Johannes Bogardus. Early works by Hals, such as Two Boys Playing and Singing and a Banquet of the Officers of the St Joris Doele or Arquebusiers of St George (1616), show him as a careful draughtsman capable of great finish, yet spirited withal. The flesh he painted is pastose and burnished, less clear than it subsequently became. Later, he became more effective, displayed more freedom of hand, and a greater command of effect.

Jester with a Lute, 1620–1625, canvas, Musée du Louvre, Paris.

During this period he painted the full-length portrait of Madame van Beresteyn (Louvre), and a full-length portrait of Willem van Heythuysen leaning on a sword. Both these pictures are equalled by the other Banquet of the Officers of the Arquebusiers of St George (with different portraits) and the Banquet of the Officers of the Cloveniers or Arquebusiers of St Andrew of 1627 and an Assembly of the Officers of the Arquebusiers of St Andrew of 1633. A similar painting, with the date of 1637, suggests some study of Rembrandt masterpieces, and a similar influence is apparent in a picture of 1641 representing the Regents of the Company of St Elizabeth, and in the portrait of Maria Voogt at Amsterdam.

From 1620 till 1640 he painted many double portraits of married couples, on separate panels, the man on the left panel, his wife at his right. Only once did Hals portray a couple, Isaac Massa and his wife on a single canvas: Double Portrait of a Couple, (c. 1623, Rijksmuseum Amsterdam).

His style changed throughout his life. Paintings of vivid color were gradually replaced by pieces where one color dominated; black. This was probably due to the sober dress of his Protestant sitters, more than any personal preference. One simple way to observe this change is to look at all of the portraits he painted through the years with his trademark-pose leaning over the back of a chair:

• 

  1626

• 

  1631

• 

  1633

• 

  1634

• 

  1635

• 

  1645

• 

  1645

• 

  1655

• 

  1665

Later in his life his brush strokes became looser, fine detail becoming less important than the overall impression. Where his earlier pieces radiated gaiety and liveliness, his later portraits emphasized the stature and dignity of the people portrayed. This austerity is displayed in Regentesses of the Old Men's Alms House and The Regents and Regentesses of the Oudemannenhuis (c. 1664), which are masterpieces of color, though in substance all but monochromes. His restricted palette is particularly noticeable in his flesh tints, which from year to year became more grey, until finally the shadows were painted in almost absolute black, as in the Tymane Oosdorp.

As this tendency coincides with the period that he was less popular among the wealthy, some historians have suggested that a reason for his predilection for black and white pigment was the low price of these colors as compared with the costly lakes and carmines. Both conclusions are probably correct, however, because unlike his contemporaries, Hals did not travel to his sitters, but let them come to him. This was good for business because he was exceptionally quick and efficient in his own well-fitted studio, but it was bad for business when Haarlem fell on hard times.

As a portrait painter Hals had scarcely the psychological insight of a Rembrandt or Velázquez, though in a few works, like the Admiral de Ruyter, the Jacob Olycan, and the Albert van der Meer paintings, he reveals a searching analysis of character which has little in common with the instantaneous expression of his so-called character portraits. In these, he generally sets upon the canvas the fleeting aspect of the various stages of merriment, from the subtle, half ironic smile that quivers round the lips of the curiously misnamed Laughing Cavalier to the imbecile grin of the Malle Babbe. To this group of pictures belong Baron Gustav Rothschilds Jester, the Bohemienne and the Fisher Boy, whilst the Portrait of the Artist with his Second Wife, and the somewhat confused group of the Beresteyn Family at the Louvre show a similar tendency. Far less scattered in arrangement than this Beresteyn group, and in every respect one of the most masterly of Hals' achievements is the group called The Painter and his Family, which was almost unknown until it appeared at the winter exhibition at the Royal Academy in 1906.

Many of Hals' works have disappeared, but it is not known how many. According to the most authoritative present day catalogue, compiled by Seymour Slive in 1970-1974 (Slive's last great Hals exhibition catalogue followed in 1989), another 222 paintings can be ascribed to Hals. Another authority on Hals, Claus Grimm, believes this number to be lower (145) in his Frans Hals. Das Gesamtwerk (1989).

It is not known whether Hals ever painted landscapes, still lifes or narrative pieces, but it is unlikely. Many artists in the 17th century in Holland opted to specialise, and Hals also appears to have been a pure portrait specialist.

Painting technique[link]

Frans Hals. Gypsy Girl. 1628-30. Oil on wood, 58 x 52 cm. Musée du Louvre, Paris.

Hals was a master of a technique that utilized something previously seen as a flaw in painting, the visible brushstroke. The soft curling lines of Hals' brush are always clear upon the surface: "materially just lying there, flat, while conjuring substance and space in the eye."^[2]

Lively and exciting, the technique can appear "ostensibly slapdash"^[2] – people often think that Hals 'threw' his works 'in one toss' (aus einem Guss) onto the canvas. Research of a technical and scientific nature has clarified that this impression is not correct. True, the odd work was largely put down without underdrawings or underpainting ('alla prima'), but most of the works were created in successive layers, as was customary at that time. Sometimes a drawing was made with chalk or paint on top of a grey or pink undercoat, and was then more or less filled in, in stages. It does seem that Hals usually applied his underpainting very loosely: he was a virtuoso from the beginning. This applies, of course, particularly to his somewhat later, mature works. Hals displayed tremendous daring, great courage and virtuosity, and had a great capacity to pull back his hands from the canvas, or panel, at the moment of the most telling statement. He didn't 'paint them to death', as many of his contemporaries did, in their great accuracy and diligence whether requested by their clients or not.

"An unusual manner of painting, all his own, surpassing almost everyone," wrote his first biographer, Schrevelius, in the 17th century on Hals' painting methods. For that matter, schematic painting was not Hals' own idea (the approach already existed in 16th century Italy), and Hals was probably inspired by Flemish contemporaries, Rubens and Van Dyck, in his painting method.

As early as the 17th century, people were struck by the vitality of Frans Hals' portraits. For example, Haarlem resident Theodorus Schrevelius noted that Hals' works reflected 'such power and life' that the painter 'seems to challenge nature with his brush'. Centuries later Vincent van Gogh wrote to his brother Theo: 'What a joy it is to see a Frans Hals, how different it is from the paintings – so many of them – where everything is carefully smoothed out in the same manner.' Hals chose not to give a smooth finish to his painting, as most of his contemporaries did, but mimicked the vitality of his subject by using smears, lines, spots, large patches of color and hardly any details.

It was not until the 19th century that his technique had followers, particularly among the Impressionists. Pieces such as The Regentesses of the Old Men's Alms House and the civic guard paintings demonstrate this technique to the fullest.

Influence[link]

Laughing Cavalier, 1624, canvas, relined, (H) 83cm x (W) 67cm, Wallace Collection, London.

Frans influenced his brother Dirck Hals (born at Haarlem, 1591–1656), who was also a painter.^[3] Additionally, five of his sons became painters:

• Harmen Hals (1611–1669)
• Frans Hals Junior (1618–1669)
• Jan Hals (1620–1654)
• Reynier Hals (1627–1672)
• Nicolaes Hals (1628–1686)

Though most of his sons became portrait painters, some of them took up still life painting or architectural studies and landscapes. Still lifes formerly attributed to his son Frans II have since been re-attributed to other painters, however.^[4][5] Frans Hals painted a young woman reaching into a basket in a still life market scene by Claes van Heussen.^[6]

Other contemporary painters who took inspiration from Frans Hals were:

• Jan Miense Molenaer (1609–1668)
• Judith Leyster (wife of Molenaer) (1609–1660), Haarlem
• Adriaen van Ostade (1610–1685), Haarlem
• Adriaen Brouwer (1605–1638), South Low Countries
• Johannes Cornelisz Verspronck (1597–1662), Haarlem
• Bartholomeus van der Helst (1613–1670), Amsterdam

Hals had a large workshop in Haarlem and many students, though 19th century biographers questioned some of his pupils, since their painting styles were so dissimilar to Hals. In his De Groote Schouburgh (1718–21), Arnold Houbraken mentions Philips Wouwerman, Adriaen Brouwer, Pieter Gerritsz van Roestraten, Adriaen van Ostade and Dirck van Delen as students. Vincent Laurensz van der Vinne was also a student, according to his diary with notes left by his son Laurens Vincentsz van der Vinne. Roestraten was not only a student (in the Haarlem archives this is proven with a notarised document), but he also became a son-in-law of Hals when he married his daughter Adriaentje. The Haarlem portrait painter, Johannes Verspronck, one of about 10 competing portraitists in Haarlem at the time, possibly studied for some time with Hals.

In terms of style, the closest to Hals' work is the handful of paintings that are ascribed to Judith Leyster, which she often signed. She also 'qualifies' as a possible student, as does her husband, the painter Jan Miense Molenaer.

Two centuries after his death, Hals received a number of 'posthumous' students. Claude Monet, Édouard Manet, Charles-François Daubigny, Max Liebermann, James Abbott McNeill Whistler, Gustave Courbet, and in the Netherlands, Jacobus van Looy and Isaac Israëls are some of the Impressionists and realists who have delved deeply into the work of Hals by making study copies of his work and further building on his techniques and style. Many of them travelled to the Frans Hals Museum in Haarlem (since 1913 on the Groot Heiligland, and before that in the Town Hall), where several of his most important works are kept.

Legacy[link]

Malle Babbe, c.1630. Oil on canvas, 75cm by 64cm. Staatliche Museen, Berlin.

Hals' reputation waned after his death and for two centuries he was held in such poor esteem that some of his paintings, which are now among the proudest possessions of public galleries, were sold at auction for a few pounds or even shillings. The portrait of Johannes Acronius realized five shillings at the Enschede sale in 1786. The portrait of the man with the sword at the Liechtenstein gallery sold in 1800 for 4, 5s.

Starting at the middle of the 1860s his prestige rose again thanks to the efforts of critic Théophile Thoré-Bürger.^[7] With his rehabilitation in public esteem came the enormous rise in values, and, at the Secretan sale in 1889, the portrait of Pieter van de Broecke Danvers was bid up to 4,420, while in 1908 the National Gallery paid 25,000 for the large group from the collection of Lord Talbot de Malahide.

Hals' work remains popular today, particularly with young painters who can find many lessons about practical technique from his unconcealed brushstrokes.^[2] Hals' works have found their way to countless other cities all over the world and into museum collections. From the late 19th century, they were collected everywhere — from Antwerp to Toronto, and from London to New York. Many of his paintings were then sold to American collectors.

A primary collection of his work is displayed in the Frans Hals Museum in Haarlem.

Hals was pictured on the Dutch 10-guilder banknote.

• 

  Banquet of the Officers of the St George Civic Guard, 1627

• 

  Catharina Hooft with her Nurse, c. 1619-1620

• 

  Family Portrait in a Landscape, c. 1620

• 

  Three Children with a Goat Cart, c. 1620

• Hals Frans Portrait Of A Man.jpg

  Portrait Of A Man, 1630

• 

  Jacobus Zaffius, 1611

• Jonker Ramp and his Sweetheart WGA.jpg

  Jonker Ramp and his Sweetheart, 1623

• 

  Married Couple in a Garden, 1622

• Peeckelhaering WGA.jpg

  Peeckelhaering, c. 1628-1630

• 

  The Mulatto, 1627

• 

  Portrait of a Man Holding a Skull, c.1615

• 

  Youth with a Skull, c. 1626-1628

• 

  Portrait of a Woman, 1644

• 

  The Jolly Drinker, c. 1628-1630

• Shrovetide Revellers WGA.jpg

  Shrovetide Revellers, c. 1615

• Singing Boy with a Flute WGA.jpg

  Singing Boy with a Flute

• 

  St. Matthew, c. 1625

• 

  The Rommel Pot Player, c.1618-1622

• Two Boys Singing WGA.jpg

  Two Boys Singing, c. 1625

• 

  Assembly of Officers and Subalterns of the Civic Guard / Archers of St. Adrian, 1633

• 

  Portrait of Isaak Abrahamsz. Massa, 1626

• 

  Daniel van Aken

• 

  Boy with a lute c. 1625 The Metropolitan Museum of Art

• 

  Regents of the St Elizabeth Hospital of Haarlem, 1641

Dutch Biografisch Portaal 12491083

See also[link]

• Han van Meegeren

References[link]

• (Dutch) Frans Hals biography in De groote schouburgh der Nederlantsche konstschilders en schilderessen (1718) by Arnold Houbraken, courtesy of the Digital library for Dutch literature

Sources[link]

• Seymour Slive: Frans Hals, 3 dln (oeuvre catalogue), New York / London 1970–1974, and Frans Hals (exhibition catalogue Washington/London/Haarlem, 1989.
• Claus Grimm published his Frans Hals. Das Gesamtwerk in 1989 (Stuttgart/Zürich; also translated into Dutch and English).
• N. Middelkoop and A. van Grevenstein, Frans Hals. Leven, werk, restauratie (Life, work and restorations) (Haarlem Amsterdam 1988). This work gives an account of restorations of the riflemen's pieces, but it also gives a picture of Hals' life and work.
• Antoon Erftemeijer; 2004 : Frans Hals in het Frans Hals Museum, Amsterdam/Gent (in Dutch, English and French), in which various chapters are devoted to Hals' life, his predecessors, portrait painting in the Golden Age, Hals' painting technique and other subjects. Many pictures with close-ups in this book show Hals' works in great detail.
• Christopher Atkins (2004) Frans Hals's Virtuoso Brushwork, Nederlands Kunsthistorisch Jaarboek 2003, Zwolle, p. 281-309).

Parts of this article are excerpts of The Frans Hals Museum, Haarlem, July 2005 by Antoon Erftemeijer, Frans Hals Museum curator.

External links[link]

• 150 paintings currently attributed to Frans Hals at Wikimedia Commons
• Frans Hals Museum in Haarlem
• Frans Hals Works, Biography and Style
• The National Gallery
• Web Gallery of Art (large collection of pictures and extensive biography)
• Frans Hals at zeno.org (German)
• Olga's Gallery
• Works and literature on Frans Hals
• Walter Liedtke,"Frans Hals: Style and Substance" (Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2011)