Tobias and the Angel with the Fish

Karel Dujardin’s classically styled biblical scenes, produced mostly in his Amsterdam period between 1659 and 1674, betray the influence of the schools of Rome and Bologna in general, and, on occasion, of Annibale Carracci in particular. The Old Testament story of Tobias became popular in seventeenth-century Dutch art, especially in Rembrandt’s circle. One of the most commonly treated scenes was that in which the young Tobias, at the behest of his accompanying angel, caught from the River Tigris an enormous fish, whose gall he used to heal his blind father Tobit.