Frans Hals

Frans Hals, The Merry Drinker, ca. 1628-30, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam.

Extraordinarily productive, innovative, entertaining and a little rough around the edges: Frans Hals was one of a handful of painters who defined the 17th century. His distinctive, freewheeling style of painting became so influential that it’s easy to forget that he was its founder. This exhibition displays about fifty of his works, centring on Frans Hals’ style, which was as freewheeling as it was lively. It was a style that won him praise and prestige, and earned him a reputation as a forerunner of impressionism. At the same time, the exhibition sets out to paint a picture of the times in which he lived. The ‘bourgeois realism’ of which Frans Hals was a master gives a new insight into the lives of his patrons and the norms, values and traditions of the age.

The exhibition website also features Frans Hals: Strokes of Genius, a short film narrated by Joanna Lumley, which takes the visitor to 17th-century Haarlem, where Frans Hals was the go-to painter for a good portrait. Whether it concerns a stately regent, a couple in love, a musician, a fish seller or a laughing child, with his innovative painting style Hals gave his subjects unprecedented mobility and liveliness. It also provides more information about Frans Hals himself and explores why his painting style was so revolutionary.

Although the website claims that “for the first time ever it will be possible to zoom in on his paintings down to the smallest detail,” this is not quite what it claims. It only seems to be possible to view some of these details when watching the guided tour narrated by Lumley.