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GRACE BEFORE MEAT
By JAN STEEN

GRACE BEFORE MEAT
By JAN STEEN (l626?-1679)
IN THE NATIONAL GALLERY, LONDON

The love of art among the English has found striking expression from time to time in a rescue from oblivion of the fame of some great artist whose masterpieces had long been unrecognised. Foreign observers have paid tribute to the discernment of English buyers who bought Steen's pictures in such numbers that the greater part of them (at least two-thirds) found their way to this country. To some extent this is accounted for by his boisterous humour, which found an echoing response in the English temperament. Sir Joshua Reynolds was so captivated with his work that he declared that "Steen's style might become even the design of a Rafaelle," while C. R. Leslie, R.A., described him as " the greatest genius of the Dutch painters of familiar life." Though at times he falls short of his highest standard, in his best work he excels the whole Dutch School in his originality, while he yields place to none in his technical mastery and his colouring.

Much of Steen's life is wrapped in obscurity, but it seems certain that after living in Leyden, his birthplace, from 1648 to 1658, he proceeded to Delft, where he set up a brewery. The venture was not successful. and he went on to Haarlem, where he joined the Painters' Guild, in 1661. Like some of our English painters he combined a genius for painting with jovial habits which were not marked by moderation. In spite of this he produced a large number of pictures, showing incidents of the everyday life with which he was acquainted. His general note is one of humour, and it is but rarely that he discards it for the quiet harmony of domestic scenes which gives an added interest to such pictures as " Grace Before Meat".

From the book "Famous Paintings" Volume 2 printed in 1913.

Large files of this public domain print are available at Stock Photos at Songs of Praise
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Online "Name the Painting"

Jan Steen Paintings
at Olga's Gallery

Jan Steen Biography
at Olga's Gallery

Jan Steen
at Wikipedia

Jan Steen Genre Paintings
at Web Gallery of Art (2 pages)

Steen Paintings
at Wikipedia

Famous Paintings in this Series

James Archer My Great Grandmother	Bashkirtseff The Meeting	Bouguereau Charity	John Brett From the Dorsetshire Cliffs
Arnesby Brown The River Bank	Joseph Clark Mother's Darling	John Constable The Hay-Wain	Jean Baptiste Camille Corot The Fisherman's Hut
Jean Baptiste Camille Corot A Flood	Leonardo Da Vinci Monna Lisa	Edouard Detaille The Dream	Henri Fantin-Latour Flowers
Thomas Gainsborough Queen Charlotte	Thomas Gainsborough The Market Cart	Jean Baptiste Greuze The Head of a Girl	Jean Baptiste Greuze Fidelity
James Clark Hook Home With the Tide	Alfred William Hunt Windsor Castle	Josef Israels The Shipwrecked Mariner	B.W. Leader The Stream in Summer-time
Madame Vigee Le Brun Portrait of the Artist	Alphonse Legros A Canal With a Fisherman	Anton Mauve Watering Horses	J.L.E. Meissonier The Cavalier
Sir J.E. Millais Speak! Speak!	Sir J.E. Mallais My First Sermon	George Morland The Reckoning	George Morland The Inside of a Stable
Murillo The Immaculate Conception of the Virgin	Alfred Parsons When Nature Painted All Things Gay	Ralph Peacock The Sisters	Rembrandt Syndics of the Cloth Merchants' Guild
Guido Reni "Ecce Homo"	Sir Joshua Reynolds Portrait of Mrs. Richard Hoare With Her Infant Son	Briton Riviere The Temptation in the Wilderness	Dante Gabriel Rossetti Day Dreams
John Singer Sargent Miss Ellen Terry as Lady Macbeth	Lady Stanley (Dorothy Tennant) His First Offence	Jan Steen Grace Before Meat	Marcus Stone On the Road from Waterloo to Paris
Constant Troyon Watering Cattle	H.S. Tuke "All Hands to the Pumps"	Velazquez King Philip IV. of Spain	S.E. Waller Sweethearts and Wives
Thomas Webster The Smile	Index Famous Paintings Volume 1 Art Gallery	Index Famous Paintings Volume 2 Art Gallery	Index Art Appreciation Lessons