It is impossible not to love this girl immediately. That is because of her charming face and beautiful outfit, but of course, above all, the delicate way Johannes Verspronck painted her.
Verspronck (1597-1662) was a Haarlem painter who was clearly influenced, and probably also taught, by Frans Hals. But while Hals got famous for his rough strokes, Verspronck specialized in very fine and precise paintings, mostly portraits of wealthy burghers. Verspronck didn’t portray the child in an idealized way, but instead used all means to present her as convincingly as possible. He made efforts to show us the many details of her blue dress and the texture of the different materials; the gold lace, the jewelry and the ostrich feather. The lighting makes the girl’s sensitive features appear very lively to us. In her fashionable dress she looks older than she actually is: circa ten years old. Until the end of the eighteenth century children were assumed to be small adults and treated and clothed as such.
We have no idea of her name, but the Rijksmuseum Twenthe (an excellent art museum in the city of Enschede) owns two pendant paintings that are, very probably, portraits of the girl’s parents. These two works are considered highlights in Verspronck’s oeuvre as well, and I sometimes wonder who that family might have been that inspired the artist to create these wonderful pieces of art.
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