The Doctor's Office, Antwerp School Attributed to Gerard Thomas (Antwerp 1663-1720) with the collaboration of Balthazar van den Bossche (1681-1715)

Antwerp School
Attributed to Gerard Thomas (Antwerp 1663-1720) with the collaboration of Balthazar van den Bossche (Antwerp 1681-1715)
The Doctor's Office

Gerard Thomas was a late Baroque Flemish painter specializing in studio and gallery interiors. He became master of the Antwerp Guild of Saint Luke in 1688–89 and served twice as dean. Around 1700, he specialized in interior painting, drawing inspiration from the works of David Teniers and the interior views of the offices of physicians, artists, alchemists, apothecaries, geographers, and philosophers. This theme was influenced by the tradition of Antwerp's amateur cabinets, a kind of private museum of wealthy Flemish merchants. He also trained as an alchemist, and this interest inspired some of his most notable works.
While his predecessors favored more or less close-up shots, emphasizing figures rather than settings, Thomas distanced his viewpoint, placing great importance on the setting and, above all, on the numerous objects within it. He painted them with exquisite detail, from the ever-present, precious globe—almost his signature—to the common broom, from enameled terracotta vases to glass light bulbs, from stills to antique parchment-bound volumes, including utensils and a wide variety of everyday containers. He studied the effects of light on various materials, including glass, copper, silver, pewter...
His subjects were often misunderstood, simplified by the reductive term "charlatan" or "alchemist." In reality, his paintings often feature actual clinics in which the doctor, along with apprentices and assistants, practiced his profession, depicted with great realism and precision.
It is no coincidence that some of his paintings are part of the collection of Sir Henry Wellcome (1853-1936), a British pharmaceutical magnate and founder of the Wellcome Foundation, a passionate collector of objects related to the sciences of medicine, as well as art and healing.

Balthazar van den Bossche was a pupil of Gerard Thomas, master of the Antwerp guild from 1697. Like his master, he specialized in interior painting, but thanks to a period spent with his own studio in Paris, aware of the prevailing market preference for French art, he adapted his Flemish style to conform to Parisian tastes. The subjects remained very similar to those of his master, but he refined his painting style, particularly his portraits, strongly influenced by the style of Coypel and Watteau.

Our painting effectively combines the skills of the two painters, as often happened in Flanders, where multiple artists could contribute to a single painting, each according to their own specialization. Thomas painted the backgrounds, furnishings, and objects: the painter's signature brownish-brown background is recognizable, along with the light coming from a window on the left, illuminating a scene filled with objects: the table covered with an elaborately embroidered Flemish cloth, the dishes, the branches, the stills, the tools, and the inevitable little dog. Van den Bossche painted the characters, from the doctor to the young woman to the little girl. Compare this painting with another version, held at the Royal Museum of Antwerp and painted entirely by Thomas: you'll notice how Thomas interprets the characters in a decidedly Flemish manner, while his hand is recognizable in the globe, the furnishings, the dishes...

The painting is in excellent condition. It has an 18th-century Italian lacquered and gilded wood frame. It comes from the collection of an Italian doctor.

Dimensions
Canvas 65 x 48.5 cm
Frame 76.6 x 61 cm