"The Taking of Christ"

This is one of Van Dyke's many paintings that featured religious scenes. We see here, in the way he has rendered the reactions of the crowd, an early example of Van Dyck's skill with depicting complex emotions and individual faces, techniques he later applied to his many portrait sitters.

The scene is painted with a high degree of drama including the movement and jostle of the crowd as they reach out towards Christ, the violence of Peter towards the servant, and the dark turbulent sky overhead. This drama is further exaggerated by the low viewpoint and single light source, from a lantern held above the crowd. The lantern illuminates key parts of the canvas and draws the viewer, with the crowd, across the painting from left to right, ultimately focusing the attention on Christ's face. These compositional decisions along with Van Dyck's soft, sweeping brushstrokes provide an early example of the Baroque style of which he would become a master.