Oil Painting, 'Farmhouse with Figures', follower of David Teniers the younger (1619 - 1690), 19th century

A farmhouse with a woman standing in the doorway and three men conversing in front, chickens scratching in the yard while cattle graze in the distance at right, a church spire rising above the trees beyond

Bequeathed by John M. Parsons

Bequeathed by John M. Parsons, 1870
John Meeson Parsons (1798-1870), art collector, was born in Newport, Shropshire. He later settled in London, and became a member of the stock exchange. His interest in railways led to his election as an associate of the Institution of Civil Engineers in 1839, and he was director or chairman of two railway companies between 1843 and 1848. Much of his time however was spent collecting pictures and works of art. In his will he offered his collection of mostly German and Dutch schools to the National Gallery (which selected only three works) and to the Department of Science and Art at South Kensington, later the Victoria and Albert Museum. The South Kensington Museum acquired ninety-two oil paintings and forty-seven watercolours. A number of engravings were also left to the British Museum.

Historical significance: David Teniers II (1610-1690) apprenticed with his father, David Teniers I, with whom he also collaborated. By 1647 Teniers was working for Archduke Leopold William, Governor of the southern Netherlands. Teniers's early work is similar to that of Adriaen Brouwer, who settled in Antwerp in 1631. During the 1640s and 1650s, Teniers began to draw and paint open-air peasant fairs, generally set in front of an inn and often including a group of nobles who watch the revels with amusement. The scenes are executed in a richly varied and pastel-tinted palette.Teniers's work after ca. 1660 is dominated by arcadian landscapes. 496-1870 appears to imitate Teniers work from the 1640s-50s such as the Louvre Landscape: near Anvers which is executed in a similar sketchy style and shows figures grouped in conversation outside a row of houses and a spire in the background. A similar composition is also found in A View of a Village (National Gallery London, NG 950) in which a group of three peasants stand talking in the yard outside a farmhouse with a woman emerging from the door and a church spire in the distance.The figures and animals of 496-1870 however, are not as comfortably placed within the landscape and the perspective is not entirely convincing, making the figures seem rather large in comparison with their surroundings. The work appears to be a 19th century imitation of Teniers' style.

Genre paintings involving low class society, especially peasants, became more and more popular in the first half of the 17th century in the Netherlands. They were associated with health, liberty and pleasure that could be found in the countryside in response to the new security of the Dutch countryside following the initiation of the Twelve-Years’ Truce in 1609. The coarse appearance of Molanear’s figures recalls those of the leading figures of the Haarlem school in that field: Adriaen Brouwer (1606-1638) and Adriaen van Ostade (1610-1685).

19th century imitation in the style of David Teniers the younger

A farmhouse with a woman standing in the doorway and three men conversing in front, chickens scratching in the yard while cattle graze in the distance at right, a church spire rising above the trees beyond. David Teniers II (1610-1690) apprenticed with his father, David Teniers I, with whom he also collaborated. By 1647 Teniers was working for Archduke Leopold William, Governor of the southern Netherlands. Teniers's early work is similar to that of Adriaen Brouwer, who settled in Antwerp in 1631. During the 1640s and 1650s, Teniers began to draw and paint open-air peasant fairs, generally set in front of an inn and often including a group of nobles who watch the revels with amusement. 496-1870 appears to imitate Teniers work from the 1640s-50s such as the Louvre Landscape: near Anvers which is executed in a similar sketchy style and shows figures grouped in conversation outside a row of houses and a spire in the background. A similar composition is also found in A View of a Village ca. 1945 (National Gallery London, NG 950) in which a group of three men stand in a yard outside a farmhouse with a woman emerging from the door and a church spire in the distance.The figures and animals of 496-1870 however, are not as comfortably placed within the landscape and the perspective is not entirely convincing, making the figures seem rather large in comparison with their surroundings. The work appears to be a 19th century imitation of Teniers' style.

496-1870