The nineteenth-century French critic Théophile Thoré remarked with astonishment when he saw Adriaen van Ostade’s Travellers at Rest in the Rijksmuseum: ‘The painter was already 61 years old but one can hardly see it’.6 His admiration was shared by Hofstede de Groot, who considered the 1671 work ‘one of the best paintings from the last period’.7 Van Ostade depicted outdoor scenes throughout his long career. The earliest one, Peasants Slaughtering a Pig by Torchlight, is dated 1637,8 and the first of peasants relaxing outside an inn is from 1640.9 However, there are more open-air compositions by him from the 1670s than from any other decade, and the country inn, in particular, was a preferred theme, not only for his paintings but also for the watercolours he produced from 1672 onwards. The large scale of the figures in Travellers at Rest sets it apart from all of Van Ostade’s other pictures of country inns. Those in the paintings from the 1670s are generally taller than in the earlier works, but in none of the outdoor scenes in this genre is there such a concentration on the foreground figures. That is given added emphasis by the caesura created by the bench and the significantly smaller size of the company in the background. The two men in the foreground also differ from the typical peasant guests that feature in such depictions by Van Ostade. The one smoking a pipe on the right is obviously a hunter, for his gun is resting against the bench beside him. Judging from the case with a strap on the table the other is probably a travelling salesman. The spectacles peddler in a few drawings by Van Ostade carries his wares in a similar box hung around his neck.10 The diagonal composition of the Rijksmuseum scene was one that Van Ostade preferred in the 1670s, and he employed it most dramatically a year later in his 1672 painting of a fishmonger.11 The use of bright primary colours in Travellers at Rest is also typical of Van Ostade’s work in this period.12 Perhaps the most interesting aspect of the present picture is the sophisticated use of light and shade. While the hunter and the background figures are fully lit, the arbour in the foreground casts a shadow over the tavern hostess, most of the salesman and half of the still life on the table. The slanting direction of the shadow is opposite to the main compositional diagonal. One can readily imagine that it was this subtle play of light and shade, in particular, that impressed Thoré and Hofstede de Groot. Jonathan Bikker, 2022 See Key to abbreviations, Rijksmuseum painting catalogues and Acknowledgements