The Pancakes

Jozef Israels (1824-1911) was a Dutch painter known as the most important painter of the Hague School, whose sympathetic depictions of peasant and fisher life combine the naturalistic observation of the Realist tradition with the atmospheric landscape manner of the Dutch Golden Age. The Pancakes from c. 1875 depicts a peasant family making pancakes in the warm, atmospheric manner that distinguishes Israels's best genre painting from the more dramatic Realist manner of Millet. The c. 1875 date places this in Israels's most productive period, when he was producing the peasant and fisher subjects that made him the most important painter of the Hague School.

The Pancakes is important in the history of Dutch painting because it demonstrates the warm, atmospheric manner that Israels brought to peasant subjects as the most important painter of the Hague School. Israels's sympathetic treatment of peasant life—combining Realist observation with atmospheric landscape—represents the Dutch contribution to the Realist movement, and his warm, atmospheric manner distinguishes the Hague School from the more dramatic Realism of Millet and the French tradition.

The Pancakes is Israels's Hague School Realism: a peasant family making pancakes rendered in the warm, atmospheric manner that distinguishes the most important painter of the Hague School from the more dramatic Realism of Millet. The c. 1875 painting shows the Dutch contribution to Realism—sympathetic observation combined with atmospheric landscape.