Dutch Golden Age · 1624
Frans Hals c. 1582–1666
Wallace Collection · London
Not laughing, and perhaps no cavalier — but his confident half-smile and embroidered sleeve are dazzling bravura brushwork.
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Chapter 1 of 7
You are face to face with one of portraiture's most electrifying presences. Frans Hals painted this unknown Haarlem gentleman in 1624, at the height of Dutch Golden Age wealth and prosperity. He called nothing laughing — that theatrical nickname arrived only in the nineteenth century, long after this canvas finally reached London.
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