A Young Woman

Gerrit Dou's A Young Woman (1640) exemplifies the meticulous technique of Leiden's most famous fijnschilder (fine painter). Dou was Rembrandt's first pupil in Leiden, but while Rembrandt moved to Amsterdam and developed his famously bold, rough technique, Dou refined his surfaces to an almost supernatural smoothness that made him the highest-paid Dutch painter of his era. His small, jewel-like pictures were prized by collectors across Europe, and he founded the Leiden school of fine painting that influenced Dutch art for generations.

Dou's legendary precision is evident in the impossibly smooth surface and microscopic detail, achieved through tiny brushstrokes built up in thin glazes over careful underdrawing, creating the polished, enamel-like finish that made Leiden fijnschilder paintings the most expensive works of the Dutch Golden Age.