Ende des goldenen Zeitalters? : Aspekte niederländischer Porträtmalerei des späten 17. Jahrhunderts. End of the golden age? : Aspects of late 17th century Dutch portrait painting

Caspar Netscher (1636/39 - 1684) and Nicolaes Maes (1634 - 1693) were among the most acomplished and successful artists active in the Netherlands during the latter part of the seventeenth century. Paradoxically, however, the same factors that made them so successful during their lifetime and into the eighteenth century also occasioned their exclusion from the modern canon of seventeenth-century Dutch painting, for their art represents a decisive move away from the hearty egalitarian aesthetic that prevailed during the earlier part of the century. Responding to (and helping define) his patrons' desire for international style and sophistication, Netscher's and Maes' exquisite portraits and subject pieces are unmistakably Dutch, yet are imbued with an elegance more in keeping with progressive pan-European tastes in the tradition of Tizian and Van Dyck.