Two Laughing Boys with a Mug of Beer

Two Laughing Boys with a Mug of Beer is a painting by Frans Hals showing a Kannekijker (mug-looker). Someone looking into a mug refers to an old Dutch word for a glutton, greedy for more. This visual theme was also used to depict sight as one of the five senses, and various people have argued about whether this portrait was meant as one in a series of the five senses along with Two Boys singing for hearing and a variant version of The Smoker for smell:

Two laughing boys with mug of beer, c.1626 Oil on canvas, 69 x 56.5 cm
Artist	Frans Hals
Year	1626 (1626)
Catalogue	Seymour Slive, Catalog 1974: #60
Medium	Oil on canvas
Dimensions	68 cm × 56.5 cm (27 in × 22.2 in)
Location	Hofje van Mevrouw van Aerden, Leerdam
Accession	Br.L.4

Hals has an accomplice peering over his shoulder, and besides the other two paintings already mentioned, this theme of a main subject with a secondary witness was common to many of his paintings of the 1620s:

• 
  The Smoker, with an accomplice on the left and another in the background on the right
• 
  Two Boys singing, with an accomplice on the left
• 
  Yonker Ramp and his sweetheart, with an accomplice on the right
• 
  The evangelist Matthew and the angel, with an accomplice on the left

The theme of looking into a mug was also used by Hals when he painted the portrait of Peeckelhaeringh who turns to the viewer to show his mug. The painting of two laughing boys with mug of beer is in the collection of the Hofje van Mevrouw van Aerden.[1]

It has been stolen three times in 1988, 2011, and 2020.[1] After it was stolen on 27 April 2011, it was recovered on 28 October 2011.[2] It was reported stolen again on 27 August 2020. [3]

One theory of why it is stolen so often is because the various theft attempts have defined its market value, making it easier to sell as stolen property.[4]