Portrait of Jacob Olycan

Frans Hals, one of the period’s chief portraitists, painted the twenty-nine-year-old brewer and burgomaster (mayor) shown here and his nineteen-year-old wife, Aletta, to commemorate their marriage of the previous year. They are depicted in mirroring poses — inclined toward each other, with one arm bent and the other hanging down — a portraiture convention in use since the sixteenth century.