DOI Heft:
Nr. 3-4
DOI Artikel:Slatkes, Leonard J.: Bringing Ter Brugghen and Baburen up-to-date
DOI Seite / Zitierlink:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.18945#0211
1. Hendrick ter Brugghen,
fhe Penitent St. Peter,
canvas, 70 x 91 cm, art
market, France
explain why we have failed to find any Italian period pictures by him. Some
scholars have questioned the likelihood of ter Brugghen traveling to Italy as
early as 1604, the date provided by several seventeenth and early eighteenth
century sources, since he would have been only 16 years old at the time.11 Van
Knibbergen, to whose rescue ter Brugghen had come, was only 16 or 17 years
old in 1614,12 13 and he was returning to The Netherlands after a period of
activity in Rome painting landscapes in the background of other artists’ work
to earn his keep.M The point is of great significance for if ter Brugghen was
indeed in Italy by 1604, he would have been one of the very few northern
Caravaggesque painters in Rome while Caravaggio was still active in that city.
Karel van Mander, whose biography of Caravaggio appeared in 1604,14 is
responsible, perhaps more than any other early source, for propagating the
belief that Caravaggio only painted from life. His terminology, however, as
rendered in the original Dutch, nae t'leven - from life - is suspiciously close to
the theoretical attitude of the Haarlem Academy. It is true, of course, that we
have no drawings by Caravaggio. But this is at least partially due to his inability
11 See, for example, the biographical subscript on Pieter Bodart’s etched Portrait of Hendrick ter
Brugghen-, rep. in Utrecht/Braunschweig exh. 1986/87, p.64, Fig. 60.
12 Hofstede de Groot, “Knibbergen”, op. cit., pp.582-583.
13 According to Carel van Mander, Het Schilder-Boeck, Haarlem 1604, 297 v , Abraham Bloemaert,
ter Brugghen’s teacher, was only fifteen or sixteen years old when he traveled to Paris.
14 Carel van Mander (1604), 191 r. See Howard Hibbard, Caravaggio, New York 1983, pp.434-435.
201
fhe Penitent St. Peter,
canvas, 70 x 91 cm, art
market, France
explain why we have failed to find any Italian period pictures by him. Some
scholars have questioned the likelihood of ter Brugghen traveling to Italy as
early as 1604, the date provided by several seventeenth and early eighteenth
century sources, since he would have been only 16 years old at the time.11 Van
Knibbergen, to whose rescue ter Brugghen had come, was only 16 or 17 years
old in 1614,12 13 and he was returning to The Netherlands after a period of
activity in Rome painting landscapes in the background of other artists’ work
to earn his keep.M The point is of great significance for if ter Brugghen was
indeed in Italy by 1604, he would have been one of the very few northern
Caravaggesque painters in Rome while Caravaggio was still active in that city.
Karel van Mander, whose biography of Caravaggio appeared in 1604,14 is
responsible, perhaps more than any other early source, for propagating the
belief that Caravaggio only painted from life. His terminology, however, as
rendered in the original Dutch, nae t'leven - from life - is suspiciously close to
the theoretical attitude of the Haarlem Academy. It is true, of course, that we
have no drawings by Caravaggio. But this is at least partially due to his inability
11 See, for example, the biographical subscript on Pieter Bodart’s etched Portrait of Hendrick ter
Brugghen-, rep. in Utrecht/Braunschweig exh. 1986/87, p.64, Fig. 60.
12 Hofstede de Groot, “Knibbergen”, op. cit., pp.582-583.
13 According to Carel van Mander, Het Schilder-Boeck, Haarlem 1604, 297 v , Abraham Bloemaert,
ter Brugghen’s teacher, was only fifteen or sixteen years old when he traveled to Paris.
14 Carel van Mander (1604), 191 r. See Howard Hibbard, Caravaggio, New York 1983, pp.434-435.
201