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for Gabriel Metsu
Gabriel Metsu
Dutch, 1629 - 1667
Dutch painter. He was the son of Jacques Metsue (1587/9–1629), a Flemish painter in Leiden. Gabriel Metsu was one of the leading figures in the founding of the Leiden Guild of St Luke of which he became a member in 1648. According to guild records, Metsu was absent from Leiden c. 1650–52; probably some of this time was spent in Utrecht. In 1657 he settled permanently in Amsterdam. The following year he married Isabella de Wolff, a native of Enkhuizen who was a descendant on her mother’s side of the Haarlem de Grebber family of painters. There is a Portrait of the Artist and his Wife (1661; Dresden, Gemäldegal. Alte Meister), which was clearly inspired by Rembrandt’s Self-portrait with Saskia (c. 1635; Dresden, Gemäldegal. Alte Meister). The Rotterdam painter Michiel van Musscher became one of Metsu’s pupils in 1665.
The chronology of Metsu’s oeuvre is difficult to establish since most of the c. 150 works ascribed to him are undated. He generally painted interiors with figures, although his youthful works consist mainly of street and market scenes and religious subjects. Like most of his contemporaries, he also painted portraits, but these were usually in the form of conversation pieces, the best-known of which is the portrait of the Geelvinck Family (c. 1662; Berlin, Gemäldegal.). He also produced graphic work, little of which has survived. Some of Metsu’s lost works have survived in the form of reproduction mezzotints by Wallerant Vaillant.
1. Utrecht and Leiden, before 1657.
Metsu’s probable sojourn in Utrecht is suggested by several features of his work after c. 1650: for example, both the Justice Protecting the Widows and Orphans (c. 1652; The Hague, Mauritshuis) and the Exile of Hagar and Ishmael (c. 1653; Leiden, Stedel. Mus. Lakenhal) are painted with a broad, somewhat flat technique, which, like the figures and their flexible poses, is reminiscent of the style of such Utrecht painters as Nicolaus Knüpfer (c. 1603–c. 1660) and Jan Baptist Weenix. The focal-point of Metsu’s Brothel Scene (St Petersburg, Hermitage) is significantly like Knüpfer’s version of the same subject (Amsterdam, Rijksmus.) from which the motif of the reclining man with his legs spread is taken almost literally. It is not clear whether Metsu’s piece was intended primarily as a narrative painting with genre traits (e.g. a scene from the parable of the Prodigal Son) or as a pure genre scene. Metsu also painted several scenes of smithies during the early 1650s (e.g. The Blacksmith, London, N.G.), a subject that was popular among Utrecht painters.
During his ‘second’ Leiden period, Metsu specialized increasingly in the depiction of interiors. Like the paintings of Gerrit Dou, the pacesetting genre painter in Leiden in the 1650s, Metsu’s interiors from after 1652 always show a visible source of light—a burning candle or a window. Metsu was also certainly familiar with the work of Jan Steen, also active in Leiden at this time. The dramatic power Steen was able to infuse into his scenes must have appealed to the younger artist. The narrative elements in Metsu’s work, as well as his early market and peasant scenes, can also be ascribed to the influence of Steen.
2. Amsterdam, 1657 and after.
Later, in Amsterdam, Metsu attempted to achieve a synthesis between the visible light source of Dou and the indirect light source common in the work of Gerard ter Borch the younger. For example, the light in these paintings comes from half-opened shutters or a curtained window. Metsu’s tavern scenes are also drawn from ter Borch’s repertory. After c. 1665 Metsu also painted outdoor scenes, which required yet another type of lighting, as in the Sleeping Huntsman (London, Wallace) and the Woman Selling Herrings (Amsterdam, Rijksmus.). Other important later influences were Nicolaes Maes and the Delft painters Pieter de Hooch and particularly Vermeer. Around 1660 Metsu’s technique became more refined, and details, especially the depiction of drapery, were rendered more successfully. The painter also became more original in his choice of subjects, with works such as the Sick Child and the ‘Cat’s Breakfast’ (both c. 1662; Amsterdam, Rijksmus.), both of which are unique themes in 17th-century Dutch painting. Though not entirely typical of his style, the Sick Child is probably Metsu’s best-known work. The composition shows the unmistakable influence of the Delft school, but its unforced simplicity shows Metsu’s talent at its best. Here he avoided any distracting details and succeeded in holding the viewer’s attention by means of the child’s expression, even though the child does not look out from the picture.
The cooler palette and style of the later paintings reveals the influence of Vermeer, whose work clearly inspired the pendant paintings of the Man Writing a Letter and the Woman Reading a Letter (both ex-Russborough, Co. Wicklow; now Dublin, N.G.). Especially reminiscent of Vermeer are the women, with their high foreheads, dressed in yellow robes bordered with white fur. Nevertheless, the harmony so clearly present in Vermeer’s work is often conspicuous by its absence from Metsu’s paintings (the Sick Child being an exception). There are usually too many details that distract the viewer’s attention from the main point of the scene. For instance, in the Hunter’s Gift (c. 1658; City of Amsterdam, on loan to Amsterdam, Rijksmus.), the hunt is metaphorically interpreted as the chase between man and woman, and to eliminate any possible ambiguity in such an interpretation, a wealth of iconographic and emblematic symbols (Cupid, dog, shoes, weapon, sewing, birds) has been added, emphasizing the work’s erotic message. The result is so fragmented that its cumulative effect is lost. In other cases, the figures themselves are not always fully concentrated on what they are doing. They are distracted from their occupations in one way or another, or else they try to make contact with the viewer. The figure in the Woman Playing the Virginals (Rotterdam, Boymans–van Beuningen) is disturbed by a little barking dog, those in the Music Party (New York, Met.) barely get a chance to make any music, and in the scene of the Woman Reading a Letter a servant is intrusively present. There is frequently a little dog, either jumping up and barking or demanding attention, resulting in the calm of the actual composition and any repose in the action it portrays being disturbed in different ways.
Several of Metsu’s paintings of interiors contain recurring elements. For example, the table in A Smoker and the Woman Innkeeper (New York, Met.) is the same as that portrayed in the Young Couple at Breakfast (1667; Karlsruhe, Staatl. Ksthalle). According to Metsu’s Amsterdam inventory, it was the painter’s own table. The chimneypiece in the Young Woman with Pitcher and Wine Glass (Paris, Louvre) reappears several times, and the drinking horn in the Oyster-eaters (St Petersburg, Hermitage) has been identified as that of the Amsterdam St Sebastian’s or Archery Guild. A blonde woman posed frequently for Metsu and appears in several paintings, including the Apple-peeler (Paris, Louvre) and The Lacemaker (Vienna, Ksthist. Mus.). Another characteristic of Metsu’s work is his representation of the paintings of other artists in his own paintings, as in the above-mentioned pendants and the Man and Woman beside a Virginal (c. 1658; London, N.G.). This is nothing new in the work of 17th-century painters; it can also be found in the work of other artists, including Steen and Vermeer.
Marijke van der Meij-Tolsma. "Metsu, Gabriel." In Grove Art Online. Oxford Art Online, http://www.oxfordartonline.com.proxy.lib.fsu.edu/subscriber/article/grove/art/T057480 (accessed May 8, 2012).
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