Ball scene in elegant company, Pieter Lisaert (1595-1629)

Oil on oak panel.
Presented in a 17th-century molded fruitwood frame with gilded foliate frieze.
Total dimensions: 50 x 70 cm. The panel alone: 40 x 51 cm

In a sober but elegant interior, a young couple opens the ball. Guests and musicians gather around. Witness to the art of Renaissance living, the painter places particular emphasis on the refinement of the clothes, with their shimmering fabrics, and on a handsome young lute player wearing a short beard and earring “made fashionable in France by Henri III”.

This painting was produced by the Antwerp painter Pieter Lisaert (1595-1629), who, despite a short life, left us a large number of works, executed with extreme meticulousness and smoothness, using fine glazes of shimmering colors, mostly on copper or wood panel.
Unfortunately, current documentation does not allow us to establish in which workshop he was trained, as he seems to have had brothers who were also painters.
Nevertheless, he followed an artistic trend that was very much in vogue in Flanders at the very beginning of the 17th century, and in his style joined the Francken dynasty.
Our painting is a fine example!

Excellent condition. Sold with a certificate.

Reference bibliography :
F. C. Legrand, Les Peintres flamands de kind au XVIle Siècle, 1963, p. 76
J. De Maere, M. Wabbes, Dictionnaire illustré des peintres flamands du XVIle siècle, 1994, ad vocem