Singing Round the Star on Twelfth Night

Cornelis Troost was the leading Dutch painter of the eighteenth century. He had a theatrical background and painted narrative scenes filled with humorous details. Here we see a group of people going from house to house as they celebrate Epiphany, known in the Netherlands as Driekoningen (Three Kings). The revellers, who are dressed as the Three Kings of the Christmas story, sing traditional songs and carry a star-shaped lantern. Mothers have come out of their houses with their children to wonder at the gleaming light emanating from the star.

Troost often worked with gouache (opaque watercolour with gum arabic) and pastel (soft chalk), a technique that was particularly popular in the eighteenth century.