Interior of a Tavern

Adriaen van Ostade depicted a typical Dutch tavern interior in this genre painting. Peasants occupy a humble room with rough wooden furniture and earthen floor. Light filters through a window, catching pipe smoke and illuminating faces engaged in conversation and drink.

Van Ostade produced hundreds of such scenes throughout his long career. His warm palette and sympathetic characterization heightened peasant subjects to serious art. The detailed rendering of textures shows Dutch mastery of observation. This painting is in the Louvre collection in Paris.