Italian school; second half of the 17th century.
"Children having lunch".
Oil on canvas. Antique re-colouring.
Measurements: 72 x 57 cm.
The artist offers us a delicately worked work, making special emphasis on the poor and naive character of the protagonists of the image. In this work, starring two small children, we see a scene framed within the 17th century costumbrismo, worked with a realistic language where a balanced and well-established composition stands out, as well as in the almost pearly quality of the children's flesh tones. This composition and the subject matter, typical of Baroque reality scenes and the picaresque literature of the period, bring the work close to the naturalist trend. Costumbrismo is a genre in which popular types and attitudes, behaviour, values and habits common to a specific group of the population, region or class are described by means of a satirical, nostalgic or narrative description of the environments, customs, dress, festivals and entertainments, traditions, trades and representative types of a society. The idea of costumbrismo arose from an attempt to understand reality, or more precisely, reality understood in a particular way, from a specific point of view.