Great weather in the forecast. But no blogging or gardening this weekend until the house is in order.
From the New York Times:
“The Dissolute Householdâ€
Jan Steen (1626-1679)
Few artists combined situation comedy and moral rebuke with more panache than Jan Steen. Both are evident in this masterly depiction of an upper-middle-class family partying their way down the road to perdition. The house is still fancy, its larder well stocked. But domestic life is a shambles. A maid plies her mistress with wine while exchanging an obscene gesture with her master. The old grandmother has nodded off; one of the roustabout children chases a beggar from the door. A basket hangs from a rafter overhead. It holds a crutch and begging cup: the future. Art historians suggest that Steen might have used his first wife and children as models for the picture. And there’s no question that that master of the house, foppish, grinning, and defiantly self-aware, is a self-portrait.
