George de La Tour’s Cheat with the Ace of Diamonds (1635) depicts a company of card players. The lavishly clothed youth on the right sits pondering his hand, completely unaware of the fact that the other three are conspiring against him and plan to seize the gold coins still in his possession. To us spectators it is clear that all his efforts are futile: the man on the left is hiding a couple of aces behind his back and is about to use one. The clothes of the people at the table reveal their status: the servant on the left in a maid’s dress, the card sharp’s picaresque outfit, the low-cut bodice of courtesan in the middle, and of course the expensively decorated garb of our young victim.
The painting belongs to the moralizing genre, in which gambling was a popular topic. The theme can be traced back to the biblical story of the Prodigal Son, in which a naive young man travels into the world and eventually falls victim to the tempting but dangerous combination of alcohol, women and gambling.
The visual language with which La Tour conveys the scene is impressive. The painting’s tension is created by the various gazes that indicate the secret that the three connivers share. Although in fact nobody is looking at each other, their eyes, all turned to their extreme right corners, form the connecting points of a triangle. Similarly, the proximity of their hands symbolizes their cooperation. One of La Tour’s trouvailles is that the cheat looks behind him and tips his cards toward the viewer, thus making us accessories to the crime.
(Text: Maarten Levendig)
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