Judith Jans Leyster (also Leijster; baptised July 28, 1609[1] – February 10, 1660) was a Dutch Golden Age painter of genre works, portraits, and still lifes.

While the details of her training are uncertain, she was mentioned by contemporary Haarlem poet Samuel Ampzing in his book Beschrijvinge ende lof der stadt Haerlem (1628).

[10] Dozens of other female artists may have been admitted to the Guild of St. Luke during the 17th century; however, since the medium in which they worked was often not listed, it is difficult to determine how many were painters.

Records show that Leyster sued Frans Hals for accepting a student who left her workshop for his without first obtaining the Guild's permission.

There are few known pieces by her painted after 1635: two illustrations in a book about tulips from 1643, a portrait from 1652, and a still life from 1654 that was discovered in a private collection in the 21st century.

[18] The fact that the inventory of her estate attributed many of the paintings to "the wife of Molenaer", not to Judith Leyster, may have contributed to the misattribution of her work to her husband.

[citation needed] She specialized in portrait-like genre scenes, typically of one to three figures, who generally exude good cheer and are shown against a plain background.

[21] Much of her other work, especially in music-makers, was similar in nature to that of many of her contemporaries, such as her husband Molenaer, the brothers Frans and Dirck Hals, Jan Steen, and the Utrecht Caravaggisti Hendrick Terbrugghen and Gerrit van Honthorst.

Their genre paintings, generally of taverns and other scenes of entertainment, catered to the tastes and interests of a growing segment of the Dutch middle class.

[citation needed] In 1648, Theodore Schrevel, a Dutch commenter, observed: "There also have been many experienced women in the field of painting who are still renowned in our time, and who could compete with men.

After the realization of Leyster's forgotten prominence and talent, she was posthumously criticized to draw distinctions between her and Frans Hals, despite 200 years of her work being thought of as his.

When the original signature was discovered, Thomas Lawrie [28] sued the English firm, who in turn attempted to rescind their own purchase and get their money back from the art dealer, Wertheimer.

During the legal proceedings, there was no consideration for the work as an object of value under its new history: "at no time did anyone throw his cap in the air and rejoice that another painter, capable of equalling Hals at his best, had been discovered".

Another version of The Jolly Companions had been sold in Brussels in 1890 and bore Leyster's monogram "crudely altered to an interlocking FH.

[31] Apart from the lawsuit mentioned above, the nature of Leyster's professional relationship with Frans Hals is unclear; she may have been his student or else a friendly colleague.

Some historians have asserted that Hals or his brother Dirck may have been Leyster's teacher, owing to the close similarities between their works.