The Satyr and the Peasant

After Rubens's death in 1640, Jordaens became the most productive and highly sought designer of tapestries in Antwerp. This is a design for one of a series of eight tapestries with Flemish proverbs commissioned in 1644. It represents a popular fable by the Greek storyteller Aesop in which a satyr is so baffled at witnessing a peasant first blow on his hands to warm them, and then blow on his porridge to cool it, that he decides that this peasant, someone who blows both hot and cold, cannot be trusted. Jordaens depicted this story throughout his career, often, such as here, using the features of himself and his wife, Catharina van Noort for those of the peasant and his wife. -- Exhibition Label, from "Power and Grace: Drawings by Rubens, Van Dyck, and Jordaens"