Jan Victors - A Village Scene with a Cobbler [c.1650]

Jan Victors - A Village Scene with a Cobbler [c.1650], a photo by Gandalf's Gallery on Flickr.

The costume of the old woman on the left, with its prominent gold braiding on the bodice, was traditional dress in the Province of North Holland. In the right background a quack has set up his stall beneath his distinctive Chinese umbrella. The model for the cobbler reappears in Victors' The Swine Butcher, signed and dated 1648 (Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum) and in another picture of 1651 (York, City Art Gallery). This picture was probably painted in about 1650.

Jan Victors was born and worked in Amsterdam; he may have studied with Rembrandt in the years around 1640. In 1676 Victors went to the Dutch East Indies and apparently died there. He was a painter of religious and genre subjects.

[Oil on canvas, 63 x 78.5 cm]