Market Scene with a Quack Jan Victors

Seventeenth-century Dutch painters found an ideal source of subject matter in the practices of barber surgeons, who extracted teeth, performed bloodletting and healed wounds in public at marketplaces. Many of them were charlatans, like the opulently dressed quack in this painting by Jan Victors, treating his patient as though they were on stage, and offering his miracle potions for sale. The self-appointed medicine man is a symbolic figure, the embodiment of the morally reprehensible practice of deception, whose attribute is the Chinese parasol. At the same time, fitting in with the period’s fondness for depictions of the five senses, the operation may allude to the sense of touch. Victors, who was one of Rembrandt’s pupils, painted mainly genre pieces. This work is an example of his anecdotal scenes, taken from everyday life. The same theme and composition, with a crowd of onlookers gathered around a table, recurs in other works by the artist.