The Development of Genre Subject Matter: Scenes Drawn from Everyday Life

During the 1650s, Ter Borch often focused on subjects of daily life in which a few people, usually two or three, engage in activities that take place in formal interiors. In most instances, the protagonists, shown wearing elegant clothes, interact through refined, graceful gestures. The circumstances of what is actually happening in these pictures remain a mystery. The artist focuses attention onto the enigmatic nature of human interaction through body language, gesture, and suggestive eye contact.

Ter Borch was active in various Dutch cities during the period from 1649 to 1654, including Zwolle, his birthplace. Zwolle was a strategic military post that protected the eastern border of the Dutch Republic. Soldiers were quartered there with the local people, who ranged from a small upper class to local artisans and farmers. With a characteristic eye for detail, Ter Borch depicted common subjects such as a knife grinder at work in his shed, a maid milking a cow, or a groom tending a horse tied in a stable. The painter represented all these subjects in unprecedented ways: their animal companions upstage the human participants. The artist presents the coats of these animals with the same sensuousness, as the exquisite satin dresses worn by the women in more formal interiors.


Image Detail: The Grinder's Family, ca. 1653; Oil on canvas. Staatliche Museen zu Berlin - Preussischer Kulturbesitz, Gemäldegalerie. Photo: Jörg P. Anders/bpk 2003.