Adriaen Brouwer
Adriaen Brouwer is a painter and a draftsman originating from the Southern Netherlands. Brouwer is active both in the Northern as well as Southern Netherlands. Rather little is known about his life. He accrues many debts, but is also a member of the Rhetoric Chamber De Violieren. Few works of his are signed, not one is dated. Brouwer's work consists out of merely some sixty paintings that are nearly all in small format.
He primarily enjoys fame as a genre painter. Rural pieces with card players, smokers, gluttons and fighters in inns make up his signature work. These pieces with common people have a moralistic ground and contain references to moralistic literature or even possibly indicate a Neo-Stoic stance. In the latter case, the many gradations of anger in Brouwer's work are a form of a lack of Stoicism.
Brouwer is influenced by Dirck Hals (1591-1656) in Haarlem, among others. Around 1630, Brouwer's palette is marked by browns, greys and greens. Setting and figures form a unity. The artist paints personages with expressive and dramatic facial expressions on stage. They teeter on the edge of caricature. Shrewd detail is given to the interiors.
The painter has a notably free, sketchy manner of painting, whereby he thinly applies the paint. The artist also paints a few late landscapes in addition to the rural pieces. They appear atmospheric and are also painted with a loose touch.
Adriaen Brouwer has a significant influence on his contemporaries in Antwerp and Haarlem. One of his followers is David Teniers II (1610-1690). Both Rubens and Rembrandt value his work. Rubens has 17 works of the artist in his possession.
(Text: Matthias Depoorter, 2018)
