Fortune-Teller with Soldiers
Artist: Valentin de Boulogne (French (active Rome), 1591-1632)
Date: about 1620
Dimensions:
Painting: 58 7/8 × 93 7/8 in. (149.5 × 238.4 cm)
Frame: 72 1/2 × 107 3/4 × 5 in. (184.2 × 273.7 × 12.7 cm)
Medium: oil on canvas
Classification: Paintings
Credit Line: Purchased with funds from the Libbey Endowment, Gift of Edward Drummond Libbey
Object number: 1981.53
Label Text:Within a dark tavern, a group of drinkers seems caught up in a scene of fortune and deceit. A fortune teller reads the palm of a naïve young soldier, who seems to wait fearfully to hear his fate. On the left, a round robin of thievery takes place: the palm reader has just taken a coin from the soldier in exchange for her prophetic—and possibly dubious—services but is oblivious to the man in a red hat who lifts a finger to his mouth, asking the viewer to keep silent as he steals a rooster from her. He doesn’t notice that his pocket is being picked in turn. The soldier on the far right appeals directly to the viewer, as if soliciting our judgment on the questionable events taking place around the table.
On view
In Collection(s)