Background
Adriaen van Ostade was born on December 10, 1610, in Haarlem, Netherlands. He was the eldest son of Jan Hendricx Ostade, a weaver. Also, Adriaen had a brother, Isaac van Ostade, a painter.
Adriaen van Ostade was born on December 10, 1610, in Haarlem, Netherlands. He was the eldest son of Jan Hendricx Ostade, a weaver. Also, Adriaen had a brother, Isaac van Ostade, a painter.
In 1627, Adriaen van Ostade studied in the studio of Frans Hals, where he was also strongly influenced by his fellow student Adriaen Brouwer.
In his early years, van Ostade enjoyed painting village scenes of peasants dancing, fighting and drinking. Also, he used caricature effects in his work, which was in general joyful and exuberant.
In 1634, the painter became a member of Haarlem Guild of St. Luke. Also, approximately in 1636, van Ostade joined the Oude Schuts civic guard company in Haarlem.
It was in about 1640, that van Ostade’s style began seeing a change. Rembrandt was then perhaps the best known painter in Holland, and his style was to have a great influence on other painters, Adriaen was not an exception. His paintings began addressing religious themes during these years. In another decade, by the 1650's, van Ostade again changed his style. His paintings became technically finer, and the depth of his work was greater, though he continued using a similar palette of greys, browns and blues.
Later in his career, Adriaen played an active part in the administration of the Saint Luke’s Guild, holding the post of a head in 1647 and 1661. In 1662, he was appointed a deacon of the Guild.
During the last decades of the painter's life, his prolific output provided him with a substantial income, and by 1670, he was living in relative comfort. In 1672, at the time of the French invasion of the Netherlands, van Ostade fled Haarlem and moved to Amsterdam. He didn't produce as much work as before this time, but he taught at his own studio, where his pupils included Cornelis Pietersz Bega, Cornelis Dusart, Jan de Groot, Frans de Jongh, Michiel van Musscher and others. However, the quality of his work did not diminish in his later years.
Peasant at a Window
A Peasant Family Outside a Cottage
A Frozen Lake
The Merry Peasant
A Village Inn
Tavern Scene
Scene in the Tavern
Cottage Interior with a Family around the Hearth
Sense of Smell
Scissors Grinder
Interior of a Farmhouse with Skaters
Dancing Couple and Merry Company in an Interior
Buying Fish
Portrait of a Scholar
Wandering Musician
Dancing Farmers
The Peasant Settling His Debt
Happy Peasants
Quarrel
A Baker
Reading a Letter
The Schoolmaster
Prayer before the Meal
The Fishwife
The Fishmarket
Smiling Smoker
Drinking Peasant in an Inn
An Old Woman by Window
The Stall Keeper
Peasants in a Tavern
Peasants Carousing and Dancing outside an Inn
Inn Scene
An Alchemist
Peasants Dancing in a Tavern
Cutting the Feather
Lawyer in His Study
Village Musicians
The De Goyer Family and the Painter
Feasting Peasants in a Tavern
The Call
A Fight
Sense of Hearing
Barber Extracting of Tooth
Dance at the Inn
The Flute Player
Village Feast
Peasants in an Inn
A Peasant in a Red Beret Smoking a Pipe
The Family
Three Peasants at an Inn
The Breakfast
A Fight
Country Concert
Interior of a Tavern
The Halt at the Inn
Smoker
The Drinkers
The Singers at the Window
Landscape
Portrait of a Boy
Landscape with an Old Oak
Peasants Drinking and Making Music in a Barn
A Man in the Window
The Fishwife
The Painter in His Workshop
In the Village Inn
Piping and Drinking in the Tavern
Mother Holding Her Child in a Doorway
Children Playing in a Barn
Resting Travellers
A Talk at Fireplace
A Tavern Interior with Peasants Drinking Beneath a Window
Interior of an Inn
The Cottage Dooryard
The Merry Drinkers
Village Tavern with Four Figures
The Violinist
In a Barn
Peasant Family
Peasants in an Interior
Village Musicians
The Smoker
The Interior of a Peasant's Cottage
Peasant Family in a Cottage Interior
Merrymakers in an Inn
Interior with a Peasant Family
Tavern Interior
Interior of a Tavern with Violin Player
Portrait of a Family
In a Tavern
In the late 1650's, Adriaen converted to Catholicism.
In 1638, Adriaen married his first wife, Macheltje Pietersdr, who died two years later, in 1640. In 1657, he married Anna Ingels. The couple had one child, a daughter, named Johanna Maria. Later, in 1666, when Anna died, the painter again became a widower.