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All our images can be downloaded in high resolution from our website for non-commercial use (research/study, educational purposes, personal blogs and social media).
Would you like to use our images in a publication? Please mention our credit line: "Mauritshuis, The Hague."
Commercial use
Would you like to use our images for commercial purposes? We would be happy to discuss this with you. Please contact our marketing department at [email protected].
All our images can be downloaded in high resolution from our website for non-commercial use (research/study, educational purposes, personal blogs and social media).
Would you like to use our images in a publication? Please mention our credit line: "Mauritshuis, The Hague."
Commercial use
Would you like to use our images for commercial purposes? We would be happy to discuss this with you. Please contact our marketing department at [email protected].
All our images can be downloaded in high resolution from our website for non-commercial use (research/study, educational purposes, personal blogs and social media).
Would you like to use our images in a publication? Please mention our credit line: "Mauritshuis, The Hague."
Commercial use
Would you like to use our images for commercial purposes? We would be happy to discuss this with you. Please contact our marketing department at [email protected].
All our images can be downloaded in high resolution from our website for non-commercial use (research/study, educational purposes, personal blogs and social media).
Would you like to use our images in a publication? Please mention our credit line: "Mauritshuis, The Hague."
Commercial use
Would you like to use our images for commercial purposes? We would be happy to discuss this with you. Please contact our marketing department at [email protected].
A goldfinch is sitting on its feeder, chained by its foot. Goldfinches were popular pets, as they could be taught tricks like drawing water from a bowl with a miniature bucket.
This is one of the few works we know by Fabritius. He painted the goldfinch with clearly visible brushstrokes. He depicted the wing in thick yellow paint, which he scratched with the handle of his brush.
Goldfinches are particularly eye-catching thanks to their red masks and feathers. Nestled between the black and caramel-coloured feathers are a couple of bright yellow ones. Fabritius produced these by adding two strokes of yellow over the black paint. With the pointed end of his brush, he then made a subtle scratch in the wet paint to reveal the black beneath the yellow. This was a trick he had learnt from his teacher Rembrandt.
More about Carel Fabritius
Carel Fabritius was a Dutch 17th-century painter with a completely unique style. He painted portraits, still lifes, views of towns and cities and history paintings, often in bright colours and with clever lighting.
In 1654 Fabritius painted one of his most extraordinary pictures, The Goldfinch. It is a lifelike portrait of a little bird pictured against a white wall. That same year, at the age of 32, Fabritius was killed when a gunpowder warehouse exploded in Delft. As a result, he left behind a small but very varied body of work consisting of only 12 paintings, each one of which is a unique masterpiece.
In 2016 was Het puttertje tijdelijk te zien in de Scottish National Gallery. Met deze video vierden we de terugkomst van het schilderij.
Het puttertje komt thuis!
Are you looking for a special gift?
Are you looking for a special gift? Or are you yourself a fan of The Goldfinch by Carel Fabritius? Please visit our shop or have a look in our online shop. From tray to 3D card and from puzzle to card holder: there is something for everyone.
Chevalier Joseph-Guillaume-Jean Camberlyn and heirs, Brussels; given to Etienne-Joseph-Théophile Thoré, Paris, 1865; his sale, Paris, Hôtel Drouot, 5 December 1892, lot 10; Martinet Collection, Paris; sold at Paris, Hôtel Drouot, 27 February 1896, lot 16; purchased, 1896
