He’s not laughing, and he’s not a cavalier (he’s smugly smirking, and he’s some kind of foppish dandy), but Frans Hals’s ‘Laughing Cavalier’ is still one of the most iconic paintings in art history.
Painted by the Flemish portraitist in 1624, that smirk is the perfect embodiment of what Hals was all about: humanity, vivacity, and the ability to bring the people of his era joyfully to life. He was amazing, there’s no doubt, but your appreciation of his output will depend entirely on how many smug Golden Age geezers you can handle looking at in one go.
He did nothing but portraiture, and was damn successful at it. He was quick, confident, prolific, respected. In the first room, he depicts a wealthy toddler and her nurse, a jester figure and a high society couple. They smile and stare right out at you, the images full of ornate detail, luscious fabric, ruddy cheeks, and cultural in-jokes. There it is, seventeenth century Dutch life, so beautifully painted it’s almost alive, all these years later.
A brilliant talent, a prodigious, special painter
And there’s a lot more where that came from. He paints merchants and diplomats, politicians and soldiers. In each, he finds some tidbit of humanity to elevate the figures beyond everyday portraiture. There’s the stern defiant poses of Abrahamsz Massa and Cunera Van Baersdorp, the grumpy annoyance of Pieter Van Den Broecke and on and on. Somehow in this parade of heavily moustached Dutch people, each feels unique, like a real person, with character and charm and personality. That’s an impressive feat.
There’s plenty of love on display too. His pendant portraits, dual images of married couples, are full of nuance, softness and quiet, conservative intimacy.
But it’s the imagined figures that are the most free and interesting. There are lute players, drunkards and sex workers, all bellowing with laughter and sniggering into their drinks. They’re weird, dark, loose things, free from the constricting limits of commissioned portraiture.
The whole show functions as a portrait of seventeenth century Holland, but more than anything it’s evidence of a brilliant talent, a prodigious, special painter.
Over the course of this many rooms, this constant stream of faces does wear a little thin. If you’re not interested in Dutch Golden Age portraiture there’s nowhere near enough drama, narrative or variation here to hook you in. But if you like your ruffs big, your dandies smirking and your soldiers drunk and hairy then Frans Hals will have you laughing like a cavalier.
