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A Tavern Interior with Men Playing Cards, 1663

Artist: Job Adriaensz Berckheyde, Dutch, 1630 - 1693

Medium: Oil on oak panel

Painting: 18 3/4 × 25 1/8 in. (47.6 × 63.8 cm)
Frame: 28 5/8 × 34 5/8 × 2 3/8 in. (72.7 × 87.9 × 6 cm)

Credit Line: Gift of Thomas Morgan Roberts in memory of his parents Emily Allen Roberts and James Thomas Roberts

Object Number: 2012.26.11

On View

Property of a Nobleman, (sale) Sotheby's, New York, lot 18, Nov. 3, 1983; Johnny Van Haeften, Ltd., London, 1984; Thomas Morgan Roberts, Washington D.C., 2012
Like many of his contemporaries, Job Berckheyde painted a wide variety of subjects, but specialized in images of everyday life. Known as genre scenes, these popular paintings reflect the Dutch taste of 1600s for familiar, non-religious subjects. Many of these paintings—particularly of people relaxing in taverns—would have hung in middle-class homes. Here they would have acted as sober warnings of the dangers of too much drink, but also served as reminders of the importance of inn keepers and other small business owners to the Dutch economy.