COSTER, Adam de

From about 1620 onwards, life-size pictures of company scenes with a moral message again start to play an important role in Flemish painting, mainly as a result the influence of Caravaggism. Both Dutch and Flemish Caravaggist genre pictures are among the most prominent expressions of this important artistic phenomenon, which particularly in the 1620s and 1630s would spread from Rome throughout Western Europe. It did not start from Caravaggio himself but his first Italian followers in genre painting, particularly the Florentine Bartolomeo Manfredi. These painters took over a number of elements from the repertoire of Caravaggio and his first followers in Italy in an eclectic fashion. This involved compact compositions with characters mostly shown half-length and in close-up in fancy theatrical costumes, using chiaroscuro lighting and the application of local colour.

In the Southern Netherlands Adam de Coster was perhaps the first painter to specialize in Caravaggist genre pieces.

In the absence of signed and documented works by De Coster, all attributions have been based on Lucas Vorsterman’s engraving after a lost original entitled The Trick-trak player. The present painting, which was also engraved by Vorsterman, shares a number of similarities with this key, lost work. Both compositions are multi-figural and lit by candlelight, with a figure in the foreground partially shading the light source. The artist adopts a low viewpoint in both paintings which means that the table-tops are hardly visible.

A second version of this composition, previously attributed to Georges de la Tour and depicting just the left-hand figure group, is in the Mus�e Municipal, Gu�ret.

Adam de Coster specialized in nocturnes with candlelight effects, one of the most typical expressions of the ‘tenebroso’ style of painting. Apart from obvious genre scenes these also include religious history pieces such as Judith with the Head of Holofernes, which as a night scene and in the grisliness of the story depicted lends itself perfectly to a Caravaggesque interpretation. The use of camouflaged candlelight links De Coster’s work to similar paintings done in the 1620s by the influential Utrecht painter Gerrit van Honthorst.

From about 1620 onwards, life-size pictures of company scenes with a moral message again start to play an important role in Flemish painting, mainly as a result the influence of Caravaggism. Both Dutch and Flemish Caravaggist genre pictures are among the most prominent expressions of this important artistic phenomenon, which particularly in the 1620s and 1630s would spread from Rome throughout Western Europe. It did not start from Caravaggio himself but his first Italian followers in genre painting, particularly the Florentine Bartolomeo Manfredi. These painters took over a number of elements from the repertoire of Caravaggio and his first followers in Italy in an eclectic fashion. This involved compact compositions with characters mostly shown half-length and in close-up in fancy theatrical costumes, using chiaroscuro lighting and the application of local colour.

In the Southern Netherlands Adam de Coster was perhaps the first painter to specialize in Caravaggist genre pieces.

This painting depicting a young woman holding a distaff before a lit candle is emblematic of the refined and dramatic nocturnes that form the small catalogue of works by Adam de Coster. The glow of a single flame illuminates the various rich fabrics and delicate features of a young woman set against a dark background. Vivid shadows cast throughout the composition define her engaging visage as well as the patterned details of her sleeve, the tufts of fur that line her robe, and the wispy tendrils of the distaff she holds near the candle.

Formerly the painting was attributed to Gerrit von Honthorst and Matthias Stom, which for centuries acted as a pendant pair to Matthias Stom’s Cavalier lighting a pipe from an oil lamp (private collection) while both paintings hung in the Palazzo Galati in Palermo.

The rich crimson colour found in her robe and striped headdress is also subtly detectable in her supple lips, the apple of her cheeks, and the sheen of the stem of the candlestick.