This young man bears many of the trappings of the sixteenth-century artist that were taken up by Rembrandt van Rijn and others in the mid-seventeenth century: the pillowy beret, the doublet with stiff collar and the pleated chemise. The application of paint in thin layers with visible hatched strokes has led to the attribution to Willem Horst, an artist in the circle of Rembrandt, thereby raising the possibility that this is a self-portrait.