Frans van Mieris the Elder (16 April 163512 March 1681), was a Dutch Golden Age genre and portrait painter. The leading member of a Leiden family of painters, his sons Jan (1660–1690) and Willem (1662–1747) and his grandson Frans van Mieris the Younger (1689–1763) were also accomplished genre painters.

Biography

left|thumb|200px|Young Woman Stringing Pearls by Frans van Mieris sr. (1658)

Frans was born and died in Leiden, where his father Jan Bastiaans van Mieris was a goldsmith, carver of rubies and diamond setter. His father wished to train him to his own business, but Frans preferred drawing, and studied with Dutch Golden Age painter Jacob Toorenvliet's father, Abraham Toorenvliet, a glazier who kept a school of design.

He seldom chose panels of which the size exceeded 12 to 15 inches, and whenever his name is attached to a picture above that size, it is reasonable to assign it to his son Willem or to some other imitator. Unlike Dou when he first left Rembrandt, or Jan Steen when he started on an independent career, Mieris never ventured to design figures as large as life. Characteristic of his art in its minute proportions is a shiny brightness and metallic polish. He repeatedly painted the satin skirt which Ter Borch brought into fashion, and he often rivalled Ter Borch in the faithful rendering of rich and highly coloured woven tissues. But he remained below Ter Borch and Metsu, because he had not their delicate perception of harmony or their charming mellowness of touch and tint, and he fell behind Gerard Dou, because Frans was hard and had not Dou's feeling for effect by concentrated light and shade. In the form of his composition, which sometimes represents the framework of a window enlivened with greenery, and adorned with bas-reliefs within which figures are seen to the waist, his model is certainly Dou.

Images representing the allegory of art were traditionally used to classify painting among the liberal arts. A woman, usually idealized, personifies Pictura, painting, and holds objects essential to artistic creation. In her left hand, she holds a palette, brushes, and a small plaster sculpture that served as a model for larger works. Around her neck, she wears a mask suspended from a chain, which may symbolize art's power to deceive through illusion. The mask, the gold chain, and the colour-changing robe are the distinctive symbolic attributes of the allegory of Painting described by Cesare Ripa in his 1593 work, Iconologia. painting had been donated to the Art Gallery of NSW in 1993 by media figure and philanthropist, James Fairfax.

References

  • Selfportrait with cittern
  • Art Gallery of New South Wales - collection search
  • Works and literature