The House of Cards shows French artist Jean-Siméon Chardin continuing the Dutch tradition of painting genre scenes or scenes of everyday life. This was at a time (1737) where Chardin’s French contemporaries were mostly involved in the classicising history painting tradition. This figure and desk of this painting is almost arranged parallel to the viewer, just slightly askew. Perhaps we could see in this work a classical sense of calm and proportion, just as the boy builds with his cards.
Jean-Siméon Chardin’s The House of Cards is in the National Gallery of London.