Old Woman with a Basket of Coal

This panel was cut out of something bigger. Rubens painted the old woman, the boy blowing on the coals and the thoughtful youth behind them as the left-hand part of a large composition that also held Venus, Ceres and a satyr. Some time in the 18th century an Antwerp dealer sawed that picture into two unequal pieces and had each half made up into a painting that could be sold on its own. Dresden's is the smaller of the two. He painted it around 1616 to 1618, when his Antwerp workshop was taking in more commissions than he could carry out himself. Cut down as it is, the three heads still read as the three ages of life, and the only light on them comes from the brazier the boy is breathing into.