Rokende man voor een openhaard stopt zijn pijp c. 1747

Curator: Here we have "Rokende man voor een openhaard stopt zijn pijp," or "Smoking Man Stopping His Pipe Before a Fireplace," an engraving by Jacques Philippe Le Bas, dating from around 1747. It's currently held here at the Rijksmuseum. What's your first impression? Editor: The overwhelming mood is one of domesticity, but not necessarily comfort. The lighting is dim and there's a pervasive sense of stillness. It feels like we’re observing a private moment, one loaded with social implications from the trappings of class in the subject’s attire. Curator: Precisely. Le Bas was a renowned reproductive engraver, meaning he primarily created prints based on other artists’ paintings. This one likely aimed to disseminate genre paintings depicting everyday life to a wider audience. These kinds of depictions were really taking hold during that period. Editor: And it's essential to remember for whom such scenes were being produced and consumed. Genre scenes may appear innocuous, but they are documents reflecting a very specific class’s perception and construction of ‘normal’ life. Notice the man’s clothing – simple, yet proper, evoking the ‘common man,’ but very much fashioned and constructed for the bourgeois gaze. Curator: Absolutely. Consider the act of smoking itself – tobacco was, by this point, a global commodity entangled with colonialism and exploitation. To show a man casually enjoying his pipe glosses over those darker realities and instead reinforces a sense of relaxed bourgeois enjoyment. Editor: I wonder, too, about the second figure, relegated to the background near the shelf, partially obscured. His anonymity raises questions of class and servitude – a subtle, perhaps unconscious acknowledgement of the labor underpinning even these simple domestic scenes. Curator: A valid observation. The contrast in focus certainly emphasizes the smoker as the primary subject and obscures the other man in a secondary state of focus, perhaps just working to keep that very fire aflame for the leisured enjoyment of the first. Editor: I appreciate the print's accessibility. It offers insight into 18th-century life and the ways in which seemingly quotidian images participate in broader power dynamics. It challenges us to unpack our own complicity, because how different are social-media curated ‘authenticity’ and staged scenes of everyday people and their carefully designed spaces? Curator: Indeed, its ability to reveal complexities within the seemingly simple remains strikingly potent today, inviting reflections about visual representation and class that continue to resonate.