He found in the artwork there a formal sophistication and maturity that could give depth to his own work, particularly in the Dutch painters and the genre paintings of Delacroix, Hals, and Rembrandt.
He died on 20 March 1955 in Toronto and his major bequest to the Art Gallery of Ontario included: The Harvest Wagon by Thomas Gainsborough, Daedalus Warning His Son Icarus by Anthony van Dyck, A Portrait of Dr. Joseph Joachim by John Singer Sargent, Portrait of a Gentleman, Isaak Abrahamsz Massa by Frans Hals, Lady with a Lap Dog by Rembrandt van Rijn, and Portrait of Vincent Laurensz van der Vinne by Frans Hals.
However, as biographer Seymour Slive has pointed out, the Frans Hals in question was not the artist, but another Haarlem resident of the same name.
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Another authority on Hals, Claus Grimm, believes this number to be lower (145) in his Frans Hals. Das Gesamtwerk (1989).
Carstanjen was a skilled collector and filled his residences in Cologne, Bad Godesberg, Plittersdorf and Berlin with Old Masters by Frans Hals, Rembrandt van Rijn, Albert Cuyp, and with antique furniture, wall tapestries, arms and armour, which his agents sourced from across Germany and auctions in Paris and London.
McEwan's is well known for its cavalier mascot, broadly based on the Frans Hals painting, the Laughing Cavalier portrait, which has been used since the 1930s.
On display was his massive art collection which included such well-known masterpieces as Holbein's "The Ambassadors" (now in the National Gallery, London), and Frans Hals' "Bohemian" (now at the Louvre).
Davis has said that her interest in this period goes back to when a print of the Laughing Cavalier by Frans Hals hung in her primary school classroom, and was further developed when she read Rosemary Sutcliff's novels Simon and The Rider of the White Horse.
Other highlights include works by the most famous Renaissance and Baroque painters, including Antonello da Messina (Portrait of a Man), Titian, Sebastiano del Piombo, Caravaggio, Rubens, Van Dyck, Murillo, Rembrandt and Frans Hals and portraits by Domenico Ghirlandaio and Vittore Carpaccio.
Frans Hals, des Meisters Gemälde in 322 Abbildungen, Zweite, Neu Bearbeitete Auflage, Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt Stuttgart, Berlin, und Leipzig, 1923
Frans Hals | Lange Frans | Frans van der Hoff | Frans Widerberg | Frans Helmerson | Frans Brüggen | Frans Bauer | Frans Pourbus | Frans de Waal | Frans Bruggen | Frans Wiertz | Frans van der Mijn | Frans van der Hoeven | Frans Tumbuan | Frans Post | Frans Koppelaar | Frans Hals Museum | Frans Alfons Janssens | William Hals | ''Meeting of Arenberg with his troops'', 1662, by Adam Frans van der Meulen | Lange Frans & Baas B | Joseph Frans Lescrauwaet | Frans Wilhelm Lindqvist | Frans Wildenhain | Frans Weisz | Frans van Mieris the Younger | Frans Timmermans | Frans Teulings | Frans Reinhold Kjellman | Frans Pourbus the Elder |
Gijsbert Claesz van Campen (c.1580 – 1648), was a Dutch cloth merchant of Haarlem who is most famous today for his family portrait painted by Frans Hals.
He also learned to admire the masters of the Dutch and Flemish schools (Rubens, Hals, Rembrandt, Ruisdael), imitating their loose and vigorous brushstrokes.
On his retirement he was honoured with a gold chain, which he wears in the portrait by his friend Frans Hals (now hanging in Kenwood House).
The museum's collections include European old master paintings, with works by Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Thomas Gainsborough, Frans Hals, Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres, and Adriaen van Ostade, among others, and 19th-century American paintings, including the well known murals by Robert Duncanson.