The Bedroom

Pieter de Hooch excelled in the sensitive depiction of people going about their daily lives, be it inside their houses or in the sheltered environment of an urban courtyard. His masterly control of light, color, and complex perspectival construction can be compared to the work of Johannes Vermeer, his contemporary and colleague in Delft.

Through his careful arrangement of the interior space in The Bedroom and his treatment of light, De Hooch infused this everyday scene with an extraordinary intimacy and warmth. Two light sources—the double windows on the left plus the open Dutch door and transom at the front of the house—illuminate the child who opens the door to the inner room. The doorway is flanked by rows of glazed Dutch tiles depicting popular children’s games. Based on the dress, the youngster could be either a girl or a boy. All small children wore skirts, regardless of gender, and the age at which a boy would change to wearing breeches was rather fluid. It is possible that De Hooch depicted his own family: his wife, Jannetje, and either his son, Peter, born in 1655, or his daughter, Anna, born in 1656.

The painting’s traditional title of The Bedroom is somewhat misleading, for the box bed against the wall was part of a large multifunctional room. The mother, busy tending to the chamber pot and airing out the linens, prepares the room for its daytime uses. The harmonious character of De Hooch’s painting and its emphasis on the mother’s dual responsibility as nurturer of her child and caretaker of the home, embody the ideal of Dutch domestic felicity.