ROUSSEAUX, Jacques de

(b. ~1600 Tourcoing, d. 1638 Leiden)

French painter, active in Leiden. His career was brief, his dated paintings were executed between 1630 and 1636 and he died in March 1638. During these short years Rousseaux is thought to have spent some time under Rembrandt’s tutelage around 1628, and like his fellow pupils such as Gerrit Dou, Ferdinand Bol and Isaac de Jouderville, he learnt to almost perfectly repeat his masters character heads, called tronies, and came so close in reproducing Rembrandt’s tonality, chromatics, and his sitter’s meditative moods that modern scholarship continually faces the difficult task of separating the works of Rembrandt from those of his skilled pupils. It is true also of the opposite, that works traditionally called Rousseaux have been reattributed to Rembrandt, such as the Man with Turban.

Jacques de Rousseaux’s oeuvre consists of only a handful of paintings which are predominantly depictions of single figures, bust-length, atmospherically lit with a painterly and detailed surface.

Lute Player Accompanying an Old Man Holding a Musical Score

Rousseaux is thought to have spent some time under Rembrandt’s tutelage around 1628, and like his fellow pupils such as Gerrit Dou, Ferdinand Bol and Isaak de Jouderville, he learnt to almost perfectly repeat his master’s character heads, called tronies, and came so close in reproducing Rembrandt’s tonality, chromatics, and his sitters’ meditative moods that modern scholarship continually faced the difficult task of separating the works of Rembrandt from those of his skilled pupils. Such was the connection to Rembrandt that the old man holding the music score is the so-called father of Rembrandt, a Leiden model who was used in the years around 1629-31 by both Rembrandt and Jan Lievens (see for example the Bust of an Old Man in a Fur Cap).

The painting is signed in monogram and dated on the lute: JR. f. A. 1631.

Suggested listening (streaming mp3, 2 minutes):

Francesco da Milano: Tre fantasie for lute

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Portrait of a Man

This portrait (in fact a tronie) represents a man, head and shoulders, wearing a blue velvet cap and gold chain. It was only in the early 20th century that the painting was re-attributed to Rousseaux, having been considered a work by Rembrandt until 1919.

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Violinist Singing

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