Frans Hals

Frans Hals's paintings bring movement and directness to portraits of the people of seventeenth-century Haarlem. Visible strokes describe faces, lace, and cloth without giving every surface the same degree of finish, allowing small differences in expression to remain prominent. Individual portraits, family groups, civic guards, and regents of charitable institutions called for different arrangements of pose, gaze, and social relationship. A Family Group in a Landscape gives parents, children, and a nursemaid several linked points of attention rather than a rigid line of sitters. Young Man holding a Skull combines an outward-reaching gesture with an object traditionally associated with mortality, making a character study distinct from a commissioned likeness. His paintings of musicians and children likewise use alert gestures and expressions. Across these subjects, the apparent immediacy of a face or movement depends on the placing of strokes within a deliberately arranged composition.