Gerrit dou biography of christopher

Gerrit (Gerard) DOU
Leiden 1613-Leiden 1675

Dou occupies a central position in the art of his own time to a point where it is difficult to over-estimate his importance. His early training was with Rembrandt before the latter left Leiden c. 1631/2. They collaborated on at least one picture, the Anna and the Blind Tobit which is in the National Gallery, London. Dou spent the whole of the rest of his career in his native Leiden and he clearly rejected whatever he may have learned from Rembrandt, instead he concentrated on small, highly finished pictures of wide-ranging subject manner, of which he was one of the most proficient masters who has ever lived.

His pictures are curiously restrained in their colour scheme; they have to be appreciated by close inspection. Whatever Dou may have known about Rembrandt, Hals and Vermeer, for him their art did not exist. Instead he be Gerrit dou biography of christopher kennedy!