Two Laughing Boys with a Mug of Beer

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Frans Hals 072.jpg
Two laughing boys with mug of beer, c.1626 Oil on canvas, 69 x 56.5 cm
ArtistFrans Hals
Year1626 (1626)
CatalogueSeymour Slive, Catalog 1974: #60
MediumOil on canvas
Dimensions68 cm × 56.5 cm (27 in × 22.2 in)
LocationHofje van Mevrouw van Aerden, Leerdam
AccessionBr.L.4

Two Laughing Boys with a Mug of Beer is a painting by Frans Hals showing a Kannekijker (mug-looker). Someone looking into a mug refers to an old Dutch word for a glutton, greedy for more. This visual theme was also used to depict sight as one of the five senses, and various people have argued about whether this portrait was meant as one in a series of the five senses along with Two Boys singing for hearing and a variant version of The Smoker for smell:[citation needed]

  • Frans Hals 072.jpg
  • Frans Hals - Two Boys Singing - WGA11077.jpg

Hals has an accomplice peering over his shoulder, and besides the other two paintings already mentioned, this theme of a main subject with a secondary witness was common to many of his paintings of the 1620s:

  • The Smoker, with an accomplice on the left and another in the background on the right

  • Yonker Ramp and his sweetheart, with an accomplice on the right

  • The evangelist Matthew and the angel, with an accomplice on the left

The theme of looking into a mug was also used by Hals when he painted the portrait of Peeckelhaeringh who turns to the viewer to show his mug. The painting of two laughing boys with mug of beer is in the collection of the Hofje van Mevrouw van Aerden.[1]

It has been stolen three times in 1988, 2011, and 2020.[1] After it was stolen on 27 April 2011, it was recovered on 28 October 2011.[2] It was reported stolen again on 27 August 2020 from the Hofje van Mevrouw van Aerden museum in Leerdam, south of Utrecht.[3][4]

One theory of why it is stolen so often is because the various theft attempts have defined its market value, making it easier to sell as stolen property.[5]

In early April 2021, a person was arrested in the town of Baarn, as a suspect in the theft of "Two Laughing Boys with a Mug of Beer" and also of the theft of The Parsonage Garden at Nuenen by Vincent Van Gogh which had been stolen from the Singer Laren museum in Laren in March 2020. Neither painting was recovered at that time. Art detective Arthur Brand told a reporter that the person in custody probably did not know the location of the works because "stolen artwork was often moved around quickly by criminal gangs". A BBC News item stated the value of the Frans Halls painting as "some €15m (£13m; $17.5m)" but provided no source for that information.[6] An article published by The Guardian stated that the work "would be expected to fetch £13.4m at auction".[7][8]

See also[]

References[]

  1. ^ Jump up to: a b Presse, AFP-Agence France. "No Laughing Matter As Dutch Masterwork Stolen For Third Time". www.barrons.com. Retrieved 2020-08-27.
  2. ^ Lachende jongen met tinnen kan in the RKD
  3. ^ Frans Hals painting 'Two Laughing Boys'stolen:police - Reuters
  4. ^ "Dutch arrest over Van Gogh and Frans Hals museum thefts". Retrieved 8 April 2021.
  5. ^ Bowley, Graham (18 January 2021). "The Mystery of the Painting Thieves Love". The New York Times.
  6. ^ "Dutch arrest over Van Gogh and Frans Hals museum thefts". Retrieved 8 April 2021.
  7. ^ "Dutch police arrest man over £18m theft of Van Gogh and Hals paintings". Retrieved 8 April 2021.
  8. ^ "Dutch police arrest suspect in theft of Van Gogh, Hals paintings". Retrieved 8 April 2021.
  • Frans Hals', a catalogue raisonné of Hals works by Seymour Slive: Volume Three, the catalogue, National gallery of Art: Kress Foundation, Studies in the History of European Art, London - Phaidon Press, 1974
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