Image of the Week 015

Giovanni Michele Granieri's The Fortune Teller depicts a barker, who excites onlookers with conjuring tricks, and by his cunning use of mystical gestures. He holds a vial, which supposedly contains an elixir for long life, extracted from the philosopher's stone. All of the gullible spectators are ready to proclaim a miracle has occurred, enthralled as they are by his charlatan's theatrics.

Giovanni Michele Granieri, The Fortune Teller, 1520.