a) Banquet b) Brawl
Oil paintings on canvas. The two lively genre scenes, which represent a heated banquet and a fight that broke out during a game of cards, are attributable to the Flemish painter Jan Jozef Horemans, known as "the Younger" to distinguish him from his father of the same name. Horemans was a very successful painter in 17th century Antwerp, where he was able to represent, with great originality and sagacity, scenes of everyday life set in inns and house interiors. The intelligent and never predictable compositions, the agitated rhythm and the masterful use of light confirm, also in this case, the great quality of his painting. The suggestive effect of theatricality is here determined not only by a narrative function entrusted to the lighting effects, but also by the adoption of his proverbial dark colors, which earned him the nickname of "the brown".
A. Jacobs, "Horemans", Grove Art Online. Oxford Art Online. Oxford University Press. Web. 21 July 2016