The Marketplace in Bergen op Zoomprobably 1590 and 1597

We look slightly down onto a scene with people gathering in small groups in a cobblestone town square lined with rows of brick, wood, and stone buildings, many with stepped rooflines, in this horizontal painting. Singly or in pairs or trios, men, women, and children walk across the square, move goods around, or talk to merchants. All the people have light skin. Many of the men have mustaches and wear hats, and some carry swords. In tones of black, olive green, brick red, and plum purple, they wear hip-length cloaks over jackets, with white collars or ruffs and brass buttons, and knee-length breeches over yellow or black stockings. The women all wear long dresses in salmon pink, coral red, or golden yellow, with white collars or ruffs, and many wear black, ankle-length cloaks, some with hoods. Closest to us, a sumptuously dressed man and woman walk toward us while another similarly elegant couple walks away. Also facing away from us, to our left, a man wearing a large drum strapped around his waist raises one drumstick as he looks over his left shoulder. Nearby, a woman peers up out of a cellar door that opens on an angle to the street. More couples gather around a well across the square, and two women and a child talk to a third woman selling wares at a wooden table to our right. A pair of hooded priests or monks walk near a man blowing on a trumpet on horseback. The buildings are mostly shades of brick red and brown, and most have three or four stories with steeply pitched roofs. More people walk along side streets leading off the main square. One gap in the buildings across from us leads to a nickel-gray stone church with a pointed spire and square tower. A grassy, green hill rises steeply beyond the buildings to our right, leading down to a waterway that extends up and away into the distance. A few boats float in the water, which reflects the leaden-gray sky. Beyond the town square, a brown stone structure like a fortress with turret towers and crenellated walls looms along the ridge of the hill to our right. Tiny in scale, people on horseback and tending sheep dot the hillside below. The date “1590” is painted on the front of one of the buildings across from us while another date, “1597,” is painted on the end of a short wall near the lower left corner.

Description from the National Gallery of Art.

Abel Grimmer painted this (probably 1590 and 1597), aged about 20. It is now at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC.

How it was made

Oil on panel

Oil paint on prepared wooden boards, usually oak in the north and poplar in Italy. The rigid, smooth surface suits fine detail and thin, glowing glazes.

Oil paint

Pigment ground in a drying oil, usually linseed. It dries slowly, so painters could blend on the canvas, build up thin translucent glazes, and rework a picture over weeks. Canvas replaced wooden panels in the 1500s because it is lighter and can be rolled.