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Jan Baptist Weenix was a versatile artist, and while he gained fame primarily for his virtuoso landscapes and port scenes, he also painted portraits, genre pieces and hunting still-lifes. He tended to give special emphasis to the human figures, and to classical ruins, which can be seen in the foreground or background of his compositions. Among his recurring motifs was the ruined Temple of Vespasian in Rome.
Weenix had devised scenes with just one or two figures in the foreground from the early 1640s. The protagonist of the present painting is a barefoot boy wearing a ragged jacket and a wide-brimmed hat. The hammer, the dazzlingly realistic glittering copper pot and the bellow lying on the ground beside him inform us of his profession.
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