Theodoor Rombouts apprenticed in Antwerp with the little known painter François van Lanckvelt in 1608 and possibly with Abraham Janssens. He set off for Italy in September 1616, and was recorded in the Roman parish of Sant' Andrea delle Fratte in 1620. While in Italy, he also travelled to Pisa and Florence, working in the latter town, it seems, for no less a patron than the Grand Duke of Tuscany, Cosimo II de' Medici.
By 1625 he returned to his native town where he married Anna van Thielen, the sister of a flower painter in 1627. Unfortunately, there are few dated works in Rombouts's oeuvre, especially from his Italian period and the years immediately following his return to Antwerp.
Rombouts made religious and allegorical paintings, but is best known for his monumental half-length genre scenes executed in a Caravaggesque style. The subjects of these latter works are typical for Caravaggio's followers and include multi-figure compositions of card and backgammon players, musical companies, barber surgeons, as well as smokers and drinkers.
