Candle-Lit Interior
by NAIVEU, Matthijs, Oil on canvas, 55 x 64 cm
The subject is probably “The Doctor’s Visit”: a lovesick woman, suffering no physical ailment, is attended by a Quack who presents her with a harlequin figure brandishing a clyster pipe, crudely indicating the true source of her sickness, and mocking her for it. It is further alluded to by the subjects of the paintings on the wall behind: a Lot and his Daughters and an Endymion or a Sleeping Cupid. The subject was popular earlier in the century with artists such as Jan Steen, and is known in other pictures by Naiveu.