The first copy is a detail from the original 'Officers and Sergeants of the St. Hadrian Civic Guard Company', on canvas, 207 x 337 cm, executed in 1633; the second is a detail from the original 'The Banquet of the Officers of the St. George Civic Guard Company', on canvas, 179 x 257.5 cm, executed in 1627. Both paintings are in the Frans Hals Museum, Haarlem. They were commissioned by the Guard companies for their respective headquarters in Haarlem and removed to the museum in 1862. The numbers 1 and 8 on the sashes of the sitters in the present lots are copied after the numbers which have been added later on the originals to identify each sitter (see S. Slive, Frans Hals, II, pl. 127 and 85 respectively and III, pp. 47/48 and 29/31 respectively).

Ferdinand Willaert was born in Ghent and studied at the art academy in the same city. He is especially known for his depictions of convents, town views and the countryside in Flanders (see P. and V. Berko, Dictionary of Belgian Painters born between 1750 & 1875, 1981, pp. 793/94, with ill.)

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