Saturday, June 24, 2017

Likenesses of Living Europeans from the 1630s

Judith Leyster
Boy playing the flute
ca. 1630-35
oil on canvas
Nationalmuseum, Stockholm

Judith Leyster
Self-portrait
ca. 1630
oil on canvas
National Gallery of Art, Washington DC

Valentin de Boulogne
Portrait of Rafaello Menicucci
ca. 1630-32
oil on canvas
Indianapolis Museum of Art

Don't be too eager to ask
   What the gods have in mind for us,
What will become of you,
   What will become of me,
What you can read in the cards,
   Or spell out on the Ouija board.
It's better not to know.
   Either Jupiter says
This coming winter is not
   After all going to be
The last winter you have,
   Or else Jupiter says
This winter that's coming soon,
   Eating away the cliffs
Along the Tyrrhenian Sea,
   Is going to be the final
Winter of all.  Be mindful.
   Take good care of your household.
The time we have is short.

 from To Leuconoë, published in The Odes of Horace, a translation by David Ferry (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1997)

Anthony van Dyck
Portrait of Flemish painter Marten Ryckaert
ca. 1631
oil on panel
Prado, Madrid

Gerrit Dou
Self-portrait
ca. 1631
oil on panel
Brooklyn Museum

Luca Ferrari and Tiberio Tinelli
Portrait of a lady
1630s
oil on canvas
Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna

Peter Paul Rubens
Portrait of Helena Fourment in a fur robe
ca. 1636-38
oil on canvas
Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna

Frans Hals
Portrait of an elderly lady
1633
oil on canvas
National Gallery of Art, Washington DC

Rembrandt
Scholar seated with books
1634
oil on canvas
Národní Galerie, Prague

Paulus Moreelse
Portrait of a man
1630
oil on panel
Hallwyl Museum, Stockholm

Thomas de Keyser
Portrait of a lady
1632
oil on panel
Gemäldegalerie, Berlin

Hendrick Pot
Portrait of Charles I 
ca. 1632
drawing, colored chalks
Royal Collection, Windsor

Gianlorenzo Bernini
Portrait of a man
ca. 1630
drawing, colored chalks
Royal Collection, Windsor

Anonymous Neapolitan painter
The Locksmith
ca. 1630
oil on canvas
Dulwich Picture Gallery, London

TO MERCURY

O fluent Mercury, grandchild of Atlas, you
Who gave the means of order to the ways
Of early men by giving speech to them
And laying down the rules of the wrestling-floor,

Where grace is learned in the intricacy of play,
It is your praise I sing, O messenger
Of Jupiter and of the other gods,
Clever deviser of the curvèd lyre,

Hider-away of anything you please
It pleases you to hide. The day you were born
You stole Apollo's cattle away from him;
Apollo had to laugh when he found out

That while he stormed and threatened you'd stolen away
His quiver and arrows too.  You stole away
Priam of Troy from Troy, bearing possessions,
Guiding him past the light of Thessalian watchfires,

Past the enemy camp of the arrogant Greeks.
You guide the pious dead to their place of bliss;
With your golden wand you shepherd the ghostly flock.
You please both gods above and those below.

 from The Odes of Horace, a translation by David Ferry (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1997)