[8] Two portraits he made in the same year of his grandmother and a family friend, Nannette Enthoven (below), attest to the technical ability he had attained by that age.

[12][13][14] At this time he was reading Émile Zola,[15] as was Breitner, and following his triumph at the Salon he spent a year travelling in the Belgian mining districts and elsewhere.

Beginning 1886, Israëls lived in Amsterdam and registered with Breitner at the Royal Academy of Visual Arts to complete his schooling.

Towards the end of the century, Israëls was introduced by his childhood friend and portrait painter Thérèse Schwartze to the Amsterdam fashion house Hirsch & Cie [nl] at the Leidseplein.

As in Amsterdam, he painted the Parisian specific motifs: the public parks, cafes, cabarets and bistros, as well as such subjects as fairgrounds and circus acrobats.

He returned to Holland for the duration of the war, living alternately in The Hague, Amsterdam and Scheveningen, where he worked primarily as a portrait painter.

Other sitters included Johanna van Gogh-Bonger and the feminist physician Aletta Jacobs, although he also portrayed ordinary subjects such as girls in the street and telephone operators.

On his return, he settled at Koninginnegracht 2, The Hague, his deceased parents' home, where he remained for the rest of his life, nevertheless making regular trips abroad to London, Italy and the French Riviera.