BEGA, Cornelis

Bega’s thematic repertoire included representations of quack scientists, especially alchemists, a subject he depicted at least four times. The version in the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles depicts a cluttered, shabby interior in which a bearded alchemist in tattered clothing concentrates intensely as he is about to place a red, powdery sub- stance on his scales. He is surrounded by the detritus of his profession: books and papers, cryptic substances, bottles, strangely shaped jars, and chipped earthenware abound. Bega has depicted these items with astonishing fidelity. Every chink, imperfection, and reflection in the implements scattered about the room has been deftly captured. He has even expertly rendered the dust lying on the discarded clay vessels in the foreground.

Cornelis Bega painted this picture twenty years before the death of his master Adriaen van Ostade. His peasants are shown with more detail than those in the work of the van Ostade brothers; in this picture, for instance, they are shown stupid with liquor, bragging and flirting with the barmaid. They are painted with graphic skill but the style of painting is rather monotonous. Bega was merely a popular practitioner while the van Ostade brothers were classic interpreters of Dutch peasant genre.

A young woman strums her lute in an expansive, stone interior. A male accompanist, whose crude facial features contrast pointedly with the more delicate ones of his companion, sings and plays the violin beside her. His plain outfit differs from his friends elegant attire. The lavish fabrics are complemented by the expensive instruments: in addition to the violin and lute, a bass violin rests against the bench in the foreground while a shawm, the ancestor of the oboe, lies just above it. Costly music books are also heaped beside the figures. The murky, grayish-brown background of this ambiguous, lapidary setting also contains a large ewer and expansive curtain whose knots and folds echo the fabric encasing the lutenist. The emphasis here is upon luxury.

Suggested listening (streaming mp3, 2 minutes):

Francesco da Milano: Tre fantasie for lute

Satin highlights, characteristic for the Fijnschilders (the most technically refined of the Dutch painters) illuminate this painting.

Suggested listening (streaming mp3, 2 minutes):

Francesco da Milano: Tre fantasie for lute

Son of the sculptor Peter Begijn, or Beggijn, the artist went down in history with the name Bega, which could be a variation of his family name, or may have been a choice forced upon him as a result of his dissolute nature which caused him have brushes with the law. He was a pupil of Adriaen van Ostade, and although he did not equal the latter’s fame, and despite being struck down by the plague when still young, he won the esteem of his contemporaries. While remaining faithful to the themes of his master (family scenes, tavern and domestic interiors) the artist did in fact break away from Van Ostade’s style, softening the latter’s marked tendency toward caricature with a more subtle humourism through which he created figures that were well characterized but in a dignified way set off by caricature.

Suggested listening (streaming mp3, 2 minutes):

Francesco da Milano: Tre fantasie for lute