ABSTRACT
SINCE 1996, I HAVE BEEN STUDYING THE genre of Northern-Netherlandish family portraits from the first half of the seventeenth century for my PhD thesis. 1 When embarking on research about a segment of Dutch group portraiture, there appears to be no avoiding Aloïs Riegl’s monumental and, in art-historical terms, highly significant work Das holländische Gruppenporträt. 2 However, if one is hoping to find an account of the family portrayed as a group, and its role in seventeenth century Dutch art, the material contained in all but the first 3 of its 280 pages appears superfluous.
