HALS, Frans
(b. 1580, Antwerpen, d. 1666, Haarlem)

Tyman Oosdorp

1656
Oil on canvas, 89 x 70 cm
Staatliche Museen, Berlin

This penetrating portrait is typical of Frans Hals.

After 1641, Frans Hals never again employ any positive or vivid colour whatever in the accessories of his portraits, his flesh tones become much lower, and, above all, the flesh shadows duskier and tending to blackness. At first this last trait is not so strongly pronounced, but as we get farther onwards from the year 1641 the tendency increases, and in one or two extreme instances, such as the portrait of Tyman Oosdorp, flesh shadows are in places absolutely black.