Jacob Adriaensz Backer

His extreme quickness in painting portraits has been particularly noticed, and Joachim von Sandrart wrote in his Teutsche Academie that a woman came from Haarlem and went home the same day, in which short period of time her portrait, cuffs, fur, collar, together with the rest of her dress and both hands, was handsomely completed in a life-sized half-length.

[1][2][3] This remark refers both to the success of the wet-on-wet technique practised in the Netherlands at that time, as well as the fact that the trekschuit, which was a new invention in 1632, allowed regular comfortable transport between Haarlem and Amsterdam and made such trips to portrait painters possible.

He was especially interested in pastoral subjects, themes from contemporary history, like Granida and Daifilo, and the huge Crowning of Mirtillo from 1641 in the Brukenthal National Museum in Sibiu (250 x 250 cm.).

The painting with the schutterij, Company of Cornelis de Graeff, for years on the same wall as Rembrandt's Night Watch, is in the Rijksmuseum.

Backer, who joined Rembrandt's studio between 1632 and 1634,[4] was one of the most independent of his pupils[5] although absorbed the spirit of Rembrand's style[6] which is reflected in his Portrait of a Woman (Saskia van Uylenburgh?)

The Hearing by Jacob Backer (1635), oil painting, Magyar Szépmüvészeti Múzeum, Budapest
Company of Cornelis de Graeff and luitenant Hendrick Lauwrensz by Jacob Backer (1642)
Perhaps this portrait of a woman in an armchair by Backer seemed more attractive to the sitter mentioned by Sandrart than the portraits by Frans Hals of her Haarlem contemporaries, the Voogt sisters , and that is why she travelled to Amsterdam for her portrait to be done.