Jan Steen, Skittle Players outside an Inn

This sparkling little picture is unusual for a Jan Steen painting. We are outside an inn – The White Swan, to judge by its sign – rather than in its dark interior, Steen’s more usual setting. People are enjoying the evening sun, perhaps as much as the entertainment.

The sun makes long shadows, but touches of white here and there – shirts and collars, and a dot of a cap on the woman behind the fence – bring the more sombre colours of the buildings and other garments to life. The leaves of the slender birch trees shimmer and the rump of the bay horse gleams. The inn seems to be a well-run establishment: the building is in good order, the customers are well behaved and the flagons or jugs visible are made of expensive Rhenish pottery.

The energetic pose of the man bowling suggests that he’s serious about his game and that, given a moment or two, the skittles will be scattered everywhere. His companions keep a close watch, as does the little boy with the crutch. Steen has captured their moods and characters with the minimum of facial detail, their poses and gestures enough to tell us about them. The man with his hat straight on his head leans forward, his arms behind him, perhaps a self-appointed referee. The man beside him, hand tucked in his shirt and hat jauntily on the side of his head, has a far more casual attitude – the flagon in his hand may be a clue as to why. Perhaps all is not quite as orderly as it seems. On the patchy grass beside the skittle party, a man sat next to the woman drinking from a long slender glass makes his plans for the evening clear with the hand sliding up under her cheerful, red skirt.

Painting in the wet-in-wet technique allowed Steen to work at speed and gave his images a spontaneity and liveliness that marks them out. Perhaps the fact that he owned and kept an inn brought him close to the people and incidents he painted, making them more immediate and true to life.