The Bat

Ferdinand De Braekeleer I, the father of Henri de Braekeleer, initially painted historical works in a neoclassical style before focusing on humorous genre scenes. In The Bat from 1860, he is amused by the fear and excitement experienced by a peasant family who are hunting down a bat. Until the twentieth century people held the superstitious belief that bats were…

Ferdinand De Braekeleer I, the father of Henri de Braekeleer, initially painted historical works in a neoclassical style before focusing on humorous genre scenes. In The Bat from 1860, he is amused by the fear and excitement experienced by a peasant family who are hunting down a bat. Until the twentieth century people held the superstitious belief that bats were evil vampires who attacked women at night and drank the blood of sleeping children. De Braekeleer pokes fun at this dogged belief. The composition is based on strict academic rules and is very similar to other examples of seventeenth and eighteenth-century genre painting.