03 — ARTWORK
Doctor's Visit
- MEDIUM
- Oil on panel, 49 x 42 cm
- TYPE
- Genre
PALETTE
HOVER OR TAP A SWATCH FOR NAME, SHARE AND HEX. SAMPLED FROM THE IMAGE — INDICATIVE, NOT A PIGMENT ANALYSIS.
THIS REPRODUCTION DOWNLOAD THE FULL FILE ↓
- FILE
- 881 × 1027 px · JPEG
COMMENTARY
UNDERLINED TERMS ARE DEFINED IN THE GLOSSARY.
The melodramatic ailment of the patient is mocked as much as the pretentious demeanour of the doctor, who pontificates but may be missing the true problem. Steen made the point, a common motif of comedies, by giving the doctor an outmoded, perhaps theatrical costume, by letting the boy Cupid smile knowingly at the viewer, and by inserting a famous comic painting, Frans Hals's Jester Pickle-Herring at top right.. Contemporary jokes also ridiculed doctors for their inability to diagnose pregnancy, a condition here indicated by the mythic pregnancy test of a ribbon dipped in urine, smouldering in the brazier.
CITE THIS RECORD — BIBTEX
@online{wga-rc93c4f2134ab98,
author = {Krén, Emil and Marx, Daniel},
title = {Doctor's Visit by STEEN, Jan},
organization = {{Web Gallery of Art}},
date = {2026-09-13},
url = {https://beta.wga.hu/artists/steen-jan-rb9ab2005aa3a59/doctors-visit-rc93c4f2134ab98},
urldate = {2026-09-13},
langid = {english}
}ACCESSED 2026-09-13. REPLACE THE AUTHOR FIELD WITH THE COMMENTARY AUTHOR WHERE ONE IS NAMED.
