Arcadópolis
The Serenade
Judith Leyster, 1629
What you see
A young man fills nearly the whole panel, seated with a lute in his arms. He looks up to the right with his mouth open, as if singing. He wears a huge dark hat, a pale striped doublet with a lace collar, and a red cloth below. The neck of the lute rises diagonally to the right, leading the eye from his hands to his face.
The gray background and the shadow of the hat make the lit face and the greenish and white stripes of the sleeve stand out. The brushstrokes are long and visible, especially in the clothes. Keep an eye out for the carved rosette in the body of the lute and the fingers of his left hand pressing the strings.
About Judith Leyster
Judith Leyster was a Haarlem painter who in 1633 became a master in the city's Guild of St Luke, where she was then the only woman, which allowed her to run her own studio and take pupils. She painted musicians, drinkers and merry scenes with loose, lively brushwork, and signed with a monogram and a star, a pun on her surname, which refers to the “lodestar”. After her death she was forgotten and her pictures were credited to others, above all Frans Hals, until in 1893 the scholar Cornelis Hofstede de Groot recognized her monogram on seven paintings.
More by Judith Leyster
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