The Wise Virgins

Abraham Bosse is generally studied purely as a recorder of life and manners, but he is also an artist of high quality. He began as an illustrator of novels and religious works and as a copier of the Late Mannerists. But in the 1630s he developed an independent and very personal style. His subjects are either taken from contemporary life, as in the Marriage à la Ville and the Marriage à la Campagne series (1633), or are clothed in the forms of his own period as in the Wise and Foolish Virgins (c. 1635).

When Bosse renders a biblical subject such as the Wise and Foolish Virgins he makes the parable the means of conveying a moral dear to the serious hearts of his audience, and at the same time gives yet another series of scenes from bourgeois life. In the engravings of the Wise Virgins we see his narrative and descriptive skill, but at the same time his mastery of technique. His detached naturalism in the rendering of the subject brings him close to Louis Le Nain, and he has further in common with him a fine grasp of classical composition, coupled in this case with a Caravaggesque use of lighting. His qualities are the opposite to those of Callot — solid technical ability and clear composition, as opposed to wit and brilliance of touch — so that to a certain extent he represents the classical phase of French engraving just as Callot embodies the Mannerist stage.