  About the Artwork
  
  
  In the Protestant Netherlands, themes which had traditionally been favored by Catholic artists, such as the Madonna and Child, were replaced by depictions of domestic virtue. This painting illustrates two qualities highly valued in Dutch culture: an orderly home and a nurturing mother. De Hooch favored this sort of subject matter during the last thirty years of his career. As is evident in this painting, he paid careful attention to the effects of natural lighting within a geometrically defined interior space. Depictions of Dutch women within the confines of the home were more than plentiful in the seventeenth century, but de Hooch's works are easily recognizable for the sensitivity with which he portrayed his figures of mothers with their children.
  
  
  Title
  Mother Nursing Her Child
  
  
  Artwork Date
  c. 1674/1676
  
  Artist
  Pieter de Hooch
  
  
  
  Life Dates
  1629-1684
  
  
  
  
  Nationality
  
  
  
  Please note:
  Definitions for nationality may vary significantly, depending on chronology and world events.
  Some definitions include:
  Belonging to a people having a common origin based on a geography and/or descent and/or tradition and/or culture and/or religion and/or language, or sharing membership in a legally defined nation.
  
  
  
  Dutch
  
  
  
  Culture
  
  
  
  Please note:
  Cultures may be defined by the language, customs, religious beliefs, social norms, and material traits of a group.
  
  
  
  
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  Medium
  Oil on canvas
  
  
  Dimensions
  Unframed: 31 3/8 × 23 1/2 inches (79.7 × 59.7 cm)
  Framed: 40 3/8 × 32 1/4 × 3 3/8 inches (102.6 × 81.9 × 8.6 cm)
  
  
  Classification
  Paintings
  
  
  Department
  European Painting
  
  
  Credit
  Gift of James E. Scripps
  
  
  
  Accession Number
  
  
  
  This unique number is assigned to an individual artwork as part of the cataloguing process at the time of entry into the permanent collection.
  Most frequently, accession numbers begin with the year in which the artwork entered the museum’s holdings.
  For example, 2008.3 refers to the year of acquisition and notes that it was the 3rd of that year. The DIA has a few additional systems—no longer assigned—that identify specific donors or museum patronage groups.
  
  
  
  89.39
  
  
  Copyright
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