Hideous head
Cornelis Dusart, a pupil of the famous genre painter Adriaen van Ostade, had a knack for capturing the quirks of everyday people by pushing their features to the extreme. In this lively sketch, an old man with a comically large, hooked nose and a mischievous grin peers out from under a massive, floppy hat. The artist used quick, confident strokes of brown wash to bring this 'hideous' character to life, proving that sometimes the ugliest subjects make for the most charming art. These types of caricatures were popular in the Dutch Golden Age, serving as humorous studies of human nature rather than cruel mockery.
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