The Courtyard of a House in Delft
Pieter de Hooch, 1658
The Courtyard of a House in Delft, painted by Pieter de Hooch in 1658, shows a quiet inner courtyard where a young maid holds the hand of a small girl. On the left, an archway leads into a passage through the house, and further back a woman in black and red looks out toward the street. Above the archway is a stone tablet with a Dutch inscription about patience and humility, originally placed at the entrance of a Delft cloister. Unlike Vermeer, de Hooch focused on architecture, brickwork and tiles rendered with careful precision, but also on domestic order: the broom and bucket left in view look clean and well kept, suggesting a carefully run household. The picture keeps a note of ambiguity, since the contents of the dish, what the girl holds and what lies beyond the doorway remain unclear. The contrast between the better-dressed mother, standing apart, and the maid subtly suggests the different roles each person plays in the home.
- Painter
- Pieter de Hooch
- Date
- 1658
- Medium
- oil paint, canvas
- Dimensions
- 74 × 60 cm
- Museum
- National Gallery, London
- Genre
- genre art
- Depicts
- Sint-Hieronymusdal, courtyard, woman, Delft, child
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