Malle Babbe

Almost all works of Frans Hals are portraits. Even those that are not (some genre scenes, and an occasional religious picture) are portrait-like in character. Hals was famous and honoured in his lifetime, but his reputation did not long outlive him. This painting, Malle Babbe, also known as The Witch of Haarlem, probably depicts a real person, possibly a mentally ill woman from Haarlem in the Netherlands.