“The Smoker”
For today, a delightful tronie…
“The Smoker” is an oil on wood panel painting by the Flemish Baroque artist, Joos van Craesbeeck, from 1626. It is most likely a self-portrait of the artist.
In this painting, a man is seeing holding a white clay pipe, typical of the period, and a bottle half-filled with liquid, presumably some sort of alcohol. He is opening his mouth in an “O” shape as he exhales smoke which squiggles through the air. Smoke can also be seen circling from his pipe.
This painting is a wonderful example of a tronie; an unconventional style of portrait in which people were depicted with exaggerated facial expressions, and often in costume. Tronies were quite popular during the Dutch golden age. They were bought by wealthy merchants with a healthy sense of humor. The Dutch master, Rembrandt, was a peer who also painted tronies.
This portrait was misidentified for many years as attributed to Adriaen Brouwer. Brouwer was van Craesbeeck’s teacher and had a huge influence on his style. He taught van Craesbeeck the art of the tronie, as well as his influential take on the genre painting. This piece was credited to Brouwer until an eighteenth-century engraving was found, identifying van Craesbeeck as the artist. After comparing it to other van Craesbeeck self-portraits, it has been reassessed as a likely Joos van Craesbeeck self-portrait.
“The Smoker” is currently in the collections of the Louvre Museum in Paris, France.
For more on Joos van Craesbeeck, please visit his short biography here.
You can find more artists to learn about here.
