(Haarlem 1610–1685)
A farmyard with children and peasants listening to a hurdy-gurdy player,
traces of a monogram and dated lower right: 1638,
oil on panel, 30.7 x 25.4 cm, framed

Provenance:
Collection of Louis Léon Alexandre Jerôme Tabourier (1858–1897), Paris;
his estate sale, Paul Chevallier, Drouot, Paris, 20 June 1898, lot 177;
with Galerie Charles Sedelmeyer, Paris;
sold to Gustav Ritter Hoschek von Mühlheim (1847–1907), Prague;
his estate sale, Kunstsalon Gustav Pisko, Vienna, 24 March 1909, lot 46;
Collection of Emmerich Ullmann (1861–1937), Vienna;
his estate sale, S. Kende, Vienna, 12 October 1937, lot 13 (as Isaak van Ostade);
Private collection, The Netherlands, by 1972;
thence by descent, until circa 2004;
with Lawrence Steigrad Fine Arts, New York City, 2004–2005;
sale, Sotheby’s, New York, 18 May 2006, lot 97;
art market, Germany;
sale, Dorotheum, Vienna, 4 October 2006, lot 191;
Private collection, Vienna

The present painting is listed in the RKD database under no. 196367 (as Adriaen van Ostade).

Both Fred Meijer and Bernard Schnackenburg confirmed the present painting as an autograph work by Adriaen van Ostade.

In this endearing painting a raggedly dressed man plays the hurdy-gurdy to a captivated audience of peasants, who gather outside the door of a farm. The mood, brilliantly captured here by the Haarlem-born painter, is sentimental and shows van Ostade’s prolific skill in portraying human emotions with a keen eye for great sensitivity and empathy. The present painting, with its subtle palette of colours in harmonies of blue and grey, is characteristic of his youthful period. The composition must have been a popular one, for several versions with slight variations are known to exist, including a version with similar measurements conserved in the Museum der bildenden Künste, Leipzig (inv. no. 799).