Country inn with a horse at the trough

Isaac van Ostade, the younger brother and pupil of Adriaen van Ostade, devoted his short career to winter scenes and the bustling life of the Dutch countryside. This 1643 inn yard, with its gathering of figures and a horse at the trough, comes from the years in which he moved beyond his brother’s shadow to develop his own expansive, sunlit view of rural Haarlem and its surroundings.