The pig killers.

Adriaen van Ostade (1610-85) was a major Dutch Golden Age artist. He probably trained in Frans Hals's Haarlem workshop, where the subject matter of fellow student Adriaen Brouwer, master of delicately painted boors carousing, determined Van Ostade's own themes. In his early work, Van Ostade depicted scenes of peasants engaged in debauchery using Rembrandt's forceful chiaroscuro. Later, he portrayed calmer, more respectable people in comfortable interiors with carefully structured spaces and picturesque clutter. By then, both he and the Netherlands had become more prosperous. An extremely prolific artist, Van Ostade produced hundreds of paintings; over 800 survive. He also painted portraits and still lifes and added figures to paintings by Pieter Saenredam, Jacob van Ruisdael, and others. Van Ostade's watercolors, about half of which were made after 1670, were attempts to duplicate the effect of his oil paintings through watercolor and were in much demand. His students included his considerably younger brother Isaack and Jan Steen.  

After Rembrandt, Van Ostade was the major Dutch printmaker of his day, producing 50 recorded etchings, and is well represented in Te Papa's collection. His prints were highly regarded by his contemporaries and remained enduringly popular long after his death and went through a number of editions.

Van Ostade's etchings depict rustic villagers inside their cottages, in taverns or in the outdoors engaged in various everyday activities. The pig killers is one of van Ostade’s most striking, both for its circular format and unusual lighting. Pictorial representations of pig slaughtering were known in medieval book illumination where they were incorporated into depictions of activities relating to the months of November or December. In this intimate, nocturnal scene, illuminated by torchlight, van Ostade combines coarse, farmyard realism with tender observation as a peasant family gathers round to witness the slaughter of a pig, which presumably will feed the large family during the long winter months ahead. As the eldest son kneels on the animal, the farmer’s wife collects the blood in her long handled pan, and her small children look on with avid curiosity.

See:

Art Gallery of New South Wales, https://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/collection/works/6724.39/

The J. Paul Getty Museum, http://www.getty.edu/art/collection/artists/460/adriaen-van-ostade-dutch-1610-1685/

Dr Mark Stocker    Curator, Historical International Art        July 2017