HENDRICK TER BRUGGHEN, 1588(?)‐1629
6483 The Concert

Neil MacLaren, revised and expanded by Christopher Brown, 1991

Extracted from:
Neil MacLaren; revised and expanded by Christopher Brown, The Dutch School 1600–1900 (London: National Gallery Publications Limited, 1991).

Plate 49

Oil on canvas, 99.1 × 116.8 cm (39 × 46).

X‐radiographs (Fig. 21) show a change of composition on the left‐hand side.

Discussion

In this painting, which has strong claim to be ter Brugghen’s finest treatment of a secular subject, he has taken a scene favoured by Caravaggio and his Roman followers — a group of flamboyantly dressed musicians seen by candlelight — and treated it in his own distinctive manner, placing the dramatically lit half‐length figures against a light background.

Caravaggio’s Musical Party (New York, Metropolitan Museum)¹ and Bartolommeo Manfredi’s The Concert (Florence, Uffizi)² are amongst the prototypes for this composition: the large‐scale half‐length figures, their crowding together within the composition and their closeness to the edge of the canvas and the bright, colourful palette, can all be found in No. 6483. Ter Brugghen brings to this existing format an individual fluency in modelling the soft edges of his forms and a remarkable subtlety of palette — which includes light blues, lemon, purple and cerise. Judson³ pointed out that the painting also displays ter Brugghen’s familiarity with Honthorst’s musical parties and in particular with the Copenhagen Musical Party by Candlelight of 1623.⁴ Certainly ter Brugghen was aware of Honthorst’s musical groups — and in this respect his Concert of 1626 in Leningrad⁵ is far closer to Honthorst’s compositions — but his treatment of such subjects is very different. Nicolson⁶ noted that comparison could also be made with Baburen’s Concert in Leningrad⁷ in which a shadow is thrown by the instrument across the face of the boy on the extreme right.

The precise dating of the painting is discussed at some length by Nicolson.⁸ Nicolson had at one time dated the painting very late, that is, c. 1628/9,⁹ believing that ter Brugghen’s candlelight scenes were exclusively of the late period. This was shown not to be the case with the discovery of two candlelight scenes dated 1623,¹⁰ and Czobor¹¹ suggested a redating of No. 6483 to c. 1623/4. Nicolson acknowledged these arguments and suggested a date of c. 1626/7.¹² The authors of the Utrecht/Braunschweig exhibition catalogue ( op. cit. ) argue for a dating of c. 1625. The present author prefers a date of c. 1626 on an analogy with the Leningrad Concert which is dated 1626.

PROVENANCE: Somers collection, Eastnor Castle, Ledbury, Herefordshire. There are apparently no early inventories of the collection but the seventeenth‐century Dutch paintings are said to have been purchased by Lord Somers (1651–1716), the Lord Chancellor of King William III, in around 1700. He made numerous trips to the Netherlands and presumably bought the paintings there. It is likely therefore that No. 6483 came to England c. 1700. It passed by descent to the Hon. Mrs E. Hervey‐Bathurst, who in 1982 sold the painting to a foreign consortium from which it was purchased by the National Gallery in May 1983 with the aid of a contribution of £500,000 from the National Heritage Memorial Fund and donations from the Pilgrim Trust and the NACF .

EXHIBITIONS: Birmingham 1934, No. 451, as Honthorst;¹³ RA 1938, No. 169; Antwerp 1952, Centraal Museum, Utrecht/Museum voor Schone Kunsten, Tentoonstelling, ‘Caravaggio en de Nederlanden’ , No. 82; RA 1952–3, No. 633; Birmingham 1953, No. 109; Manchester 1957, No. 13a; London 1976, No. 20; Utrecht/Braunschweig 1986–7, No. 23; London, British Museum, ‘Treasures for the Nation’, 1988–9 , cat. no. 30.

REFERENCES:

General: Nicolson, op. cit. , A 37.

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