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Lot Essay
Stylistically, the sensitive and enigmatic interiors of Jacobus Vrel are associated with the domestic scenes of Pieter de Hooch and the Delft School. However, as Sutton points out, Vrel's Woman at a Window, of 1654 in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna (no. 6081) predates the earliest known picture by de Hooch by four years and Vrel should thus be recognised as anticipating de Hooch and his school.
The present picture is characteristic of Vrel's work: a sense of mystery combined with a clear and controlled simplicity typifies his unpretentious domestic narratives, often based around similarly arranged domestic settings: a chimney-piece set with plates, glazed windows illuminating the scene from the rear or the side and pieces of curiously stunted furniture.
Little is known about Vrel's life: a painting of a street scene in the Wadsworth Athenaeum (no. 167) with Capuchin monks in the background has led to suggestions that Vrel worked in a small town near the German or Flemish border where at that time Capuchins were more likely to be encountered than in the Protestant United Provinces.
Interestingly, the Vienna picture and one other painting by Vrel, known as The Convalescent were listed in Archduke Leopold Wilhelm's inventory of 1659, indicating that not only were they available in major cities but also that Vrel's paintings were highly regarded during his lifetime.
The present picture is characteristic of Vrel's work: a sense of mystery combined with a clear and controlled simplicity typifies his unpretentious domestic narratives, often based around similarly arranged domestic settings: a chimney-piece set with plates, glazed windows illuminating the scene from the rear or the side and pieces of curiously stunted furniture.
Little is known about Vrel's life: a painting of a street scene in the Wadsworth Athenaeum (no. 167) with Capuchin monks in the background has led to suggestions that Vrel worked in a small town near the German or Flemish border where at that time Capuchins were more likely to be encountered than in the Protestant United Provinces.
Interestingly, the Vienna picture and one other painting by Vrel, known as The Convalescent were listed in Archduke Leopold Wilhelm's inventory of 1659, indicating that not only were they available in major cities but also that Vrel's paintings were highly regarded during his lifetime.