Classroom use - discussion of artist Frans Hals's Malle Babbe

Arts & Activities, Oct, 2002 by Guy Hubbard

THIS FACE

This old woman is sitting with her tall tankard of beer in a Dutch tavern. She seems to be yelling something at other people in the tavern. While she seems at first to have a smile on her face, the expression looks more as though she is calling out drunken insults rather than laughing happily.

ABOUT FRANS HALS

* Artists played an important part in the life of Dutch towns and cities 400 years ago. Holland (the name of the country today is The Netherlands) had become one of the great trading nations of the world and, as a result, many merchants had become rich and powerful enough to replace land-owning aristocrats. Partly because of their new wealth they wanted to have their portraits painted. Today, most people ask portrait photographers to take pictures of them and their families.

* Frans Hals became the most important portrait artist in the Dutch city of Haarlem when the city was at the height of its prosperity. Some of the wealthiest people in the city became his clients partly because they saw his portraits in each other's homes.

His wealthy clients wanted to look very important and he made that happen. However, his portraits were especially popular because they also seemed to make his subjects come alive on the canvas. Other artists in Haarlem were good, but their portraits often looked wooden and unfeeling.

* Artists in Holland and the adjoining country of Flanders (now the country of Belgium) used one of two kinds of painting styles. One was called "neat," where everything in a painting was carefully blended together. These pictures were meant to be looked at closely. The disadvantage to this style was that it led to rather rigid, expressionless portraits.

The other painting style was called "rough," where an artist used bold, unblended brushstrokes. These paintings were meant to be viewed from a distance. Artists who used the rough style painted very quickly and often did not make sketches before beginning a finished painting. The disadvantage to this style was that the beautiful clothing of rich people was not shown in detail.

* Frans Hals painted in the rough style, as can be seen from this reproduction. But because of this, many art critics disapproved of his paintings. Some of these same critics also disapproved of his drinking habits and his choice of friends who visited local taverns. In spite of this, he was more successful than his competitors in Haarlem, because his clients liked to see themselves showing warm, human feelings.

* Even though Hals was famous while he was alive, he was forgotten soon after his death. This is because other artists, such as Rembrandt van Rijn, Peter Paul Rubens and Anthony van Dyck were thought to be much better artists.

Not until 300 years later (about 100 years ago) were the paintings of Frans Hals recognized as masterpieces. Once his work was rediscovered, numbers of important painters made copies of his pictures so that his rough style came to influence many more recent artists. A few of these more recent artists also imitated Hals' style of painting and tried to pass off their forged pictures as if painted by him.

* During his life, Frans Hals spent much of his spare time in taverns drinking and having fun. While visiting the taverns, he became friends with the common people who went there to enjoy themselves and forget their troubles. It was natural, therefore, that he should paint the portraits of some of his drinking friends. Because he did these paintings for his own pleasure, they are much more roughly painted than those he did for his rich patrons. The picture reproduced with this article is one of his best tavern paintings and also one of his very best works.

* Since the invention of photography in the early 19th century, portrait painting has gradually become less important. It is now a minor art form and the very best artists no longer paint portraits. At the time Frans Hals was at work, however, portrait painting was the most important form of painting, at least in Holland.

THINGS TO DO IN SCHOOL

* Students often find that showing people's faces when they are laughing is very difficult. A useful way of getting started is to copy a successful picture like this one before trying one of their own.

Since students may not be very skilled with paintbrushes, they may prefer first to draw the face with chalk or charcoal. Pencil is not so good, because skinny pencil lines encourage students to be overly careful when they need to be as flee and loose as possible.

Once they have drawn the main shape, they may want to begin using paint and brushes. The trick here is to try and make their brushstrokes as much like those used by Frans Hals. However much they try to paint like the artist though, they are unlikely to have much success for the first few times they paint this portrait. The best solution may be to paint the same face on several occasions over several weeks--or either until the work no longer looks spontaneous or students tire of the task.

* Numbers of students are not successful in art because they believe that whatever they paint or draw must be perfect from the beginning. And yet, if they see numbers of roughly painted pictures--including this one--they may come to realize that good art need not be done with extreme care. They may then be encouraged to paint and draw more freely when creating their own work and, at the same time, enjoy the feeling of being more successful.