Gerrit Dou

Gerard Dou ( Gerard Douw or Gerrit Dou; * April 7, 1613 in Leiden, buried February 9, 1675 in Leiden ) was a Dutch Baroque painter. Because of his passion for minute detail and his consummate technique, he is considered the founder of the Leiden fine painting, which was widely cultivated until the 18th century.

Life

After an apprenticeship with his father Douwe Jansz., a glass painter, Dou went in 1624 to Bartholomeus Dolendo, was then two years with the glass painter Pieter Clouwenhorn and finally went to three years for Rembrandt in the Leiden workshop in teaching. Since 1632 he has worked independently in Leiden. In 1648 he became a member of the Leiden Guild of St. Luke; he enjoyed great fame in his own lifetime.

The influence of Rembrandt was initially high. From this and his parents Dou made ​​to portraits. From 1640 to Dou excellent, painted in small format genre paintings are known. The scenes usually take place in dark and confined spaces. Approximately 200 works by Dou are known. The most important works are now in the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, the Louvre in Paris and the National Gallery in London. Even the Old Masters Picture Gallery has more than a dozen of his paintings in stock, including for example, the trompe l'oeil still life with candlestick.

Also on the art market works by the artist were traded. In 2001, the masterpiece was The dentist at Van Ham Fine Art Auctions in Cologne for the call. The 38.8 × 26.6 cm wood panel was exhibited in 1900 at the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam and sold at auction in 1923 by the Berlin art dealer Paul Cassirer. In 1929 the painting was in a middle Rhine Private Collection. At Van Ham scored the dentist 2001, a profit of DM 5.7 million and was thus, according to Handelsblatt on 3 July 2001, the " most expensive German auction picture". Today, the factory is located in the Kimbell Art Museum in Texas.

Gerard Dou had many disciples and successors. His most significant and most faithful was Frans van Mieris.