Occupational Medicine 2013;63:251–252

Advance Access publication 23 April 2013 doi:10.1093/occmed/kqt031

Art And Occupation

Quentin Massys,The Moneychanger 1514

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The Money Lender and his Wife, 1514, Massys or Metsys, Quentin. © Louvre, Paris, France/Giraudon/The Bridgeman Art Library.

Oozing sang-froid, an elegantly dressed couple, clothes
fashionably adorned with fur, lean in towards each other,
their luxuriously covered heads almost touching, their
closeness and symmetry implying a sense of common
purpose [1]. In his left hand The Moneychanger delicately
holds a set of scales (trebuchet) and carefully weighs a
coin, whilst she, distracted from her devotional prayers to
the Virgin and Child, languorously considers his work [2].
Laid out before them on a green leather-topped desk are:
rings and a variety of silver and gold coins (schillings, reales,
écu au soleil and excelentes) [3]; pearls displayed on black
velvet; and for measuring coins, a pile de Charlemagne—a
lidded metallic container with multi-sized cups that fit
into each other like a Russian matryoshka doll. Perhaps in

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 252  OCCUPATIONAL MEDICINE
homage to the famous Flemish painter van Eyck, at the
front of the desk there is a convex mirror, which reflects
the presence in the room of the artist, Quentin Massys
wearing a red hat [4].The detail may be difficult to see
but Massys appears to be reading a book and pointing at
a notable Antwerp building (possibly the cathedral) seen
through a cross-shaped window. The enlarged details of
this can be seen online [5]. Immediately behind the cou-
ple some plain wooden shelves, ‘symbolic evocation of the
base world’ [6], display a series of ‘still lifes’ (see below)
whilst an open door to their left reveals an old man remon-
strating with a youth in a wide-brim hat. Throughout the
picture Massys flaunts his consummate skills, capturing
everything in minute and exquisite detail.
The painting (oil on panel, 71 × 68 cm, Musée du
Louvre, Paris), once owned by Rubens, is open to different
interpretations. It may be a family portrait commissioned to
celebrate newly-found wealth and to recognize the worthi-
ness of commerce and finance as respectable occupations
[7]. Others consider it a Flemish morality tale—a sermon-
izing, allegorical work condemning avarice and exalting
honesty [8]. Emblems of wealth (gold, pearls, rings, furs, a
gilded prayer book) contrast with spiritual symbols: transi-
ence (snuffed-out candle), sin (apple—the forbidden fruit),
purity (glass paternoster rosary), peace (flute) and judge-
ment (scales) [9]. Is the positioning of the artist’s image in
the mirror between the man’s riches (mammon) and the
woman’s sacred text (God) a rhetorical comment on the
ethics of capitalism in 16th century Antwerp [10]? If so,
the moneylender’s trebuchet takes on even more symbolic
meaning and perhaps explains why the painting’s frame was
at one time inscribed with a quotation from Leviticus ‘Let
the balance be just and the weights be equal’ [11].
Quentin Massys was born in 1466, the son of a
renowned Louvain metalsmith and clockmaker to whom
he was initially apprenticed [12]. However, he soon
turned to painting probably because of physical inca-
pacity or unsuitability to the trade. The change in occu-
pation also allowed him closer access to Alyt van Tuylt,
an artist’s daughter, whom he wooed away from another
painter [13]. It is not known whether or where Massys
apprenticed as an artist, but he entered the Antwerp
Guild of Painters as a master in 1491. He married Alyt,
had three children and rapidly gained a reputation for
altarpieces and other religious works, visiting Italy and
bringing back many Renaissance influences. He also
painted satirical genre scenes, such as The Moneychanger
[9] and later completed portraits of Erasmus (1517) and
Antwerp’s Town Clerk, Pieter Gillis (1517). After Alyt’s
death he re-married in 1508 and had 10 more children.
By the time he died of the ‘sweating sickness’ (plague) at
Antwerp in 1530 he had become the city’s leading, most
respected and probably wealthiest painter [14].
Today the major health and safety risks facing bankers
and their employees are principally crime-related, psycho-
social and ergonomic [15]. Lately, however, the financial
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sector has attracted much more attention because of the
risks it poses to others. In what is seen by many as pur-
suit of individual profit without individual responsibility
[16] there appear to be ‘too many men who can figure
costs and too few who can measure values’ [17]. Quentin
Massys would have appreciated Ambrose Bierce’s defini-
tion of mammon as the ‘God of the world’s leading reli-
gion’ [18].Yet, judging by his own accumulation of wealth,
the artist seems (perhaps like the rest of us) to have been
somewhat ambivalent about enjoying its spoils.
Mike McKiernan
e-mail: art@som.org.uk
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