Seated Man with a Soft Cap, in Profile to the Right, with his Right Hand Raised

Entry

The present drawing and inv. no. RP-T-1880-A-86(R) almost certainly depict the same model. In the present sheet, the young man has his left leg (apparently unfinished below his breeches) stretched out, his right leg bent at the knee and his right elbow resting on his right thigh, so that his right hand is slightly raised. (It almost looks as if the hand were resting on some sort of support, though this is not rendered.) In the other drawing, the young man is represented full length, wearing ordinary, ankle-length trousers, seated with his legs outstretched and crossed, and with his left arm fully resting on the left thigh. As the feet of the boy and the lower part of the stool in the present sheet are missing, the sheet might have been trimmed later.

Besides slight variations in the poses, the two drawings prioritize different elements. In the present sheet, the face, though shaded, is fully rendered, while in inv. no. RP-T-1880-A-86(R), it is concealed in shadow. Here, the contours of the cap are crisp, whereas in the other sketch, they are curiously zigzagged or frayed, even implying a different material, perhaps fur or soft felt. A major difference between both drawings is found in the treatment of the surrounding space. In inv. no. RP-T-1880-A-86(R), the young man is immersed in shadow (reinforced by the addition of red chalk wash), while in the present drawing, the background is left almost completely untouched (ignoring the red chalk trial at upper right). These differences have led to doubt being cast on the attribution of the present sheet to Bega: Scott catalogued it as a copy, Coenen (see Aachen and Berlin 2012) as ‘attributed to’.

Despite these differences, however, to my mind, the general treatment of the clothing is similar. Regular hatching, with slight changes in direction, is used to suggest folds, the white of the paper left blank for the highlights. For the darkest shades, the red chalk is densely worked onto the paper. The contours range from thin lines, sometimes nervously broken, to soft and broad strokes. The tendency to create undulating contours, as seen in the modelling of the cap in the other drawing, is revealed here in the vibrating outline of the collar frill. The drawing also shows Bega’s habit of hiding the faces of his male models.⁶ These characteristics are so typical of Bega that – in my opinion – the traditional attribution to the artist should be maintained. His subtle handling of red chalk differs from the drawings of other Haarlem artists, such as Leendert van der Cooghen (1632-1681) and Gerrit Adriaensz Berckheyde (1638-1698). Equally unlikely is the hand of Cornelis Dusart (1660-1704), to whom the present drawing was once ascribed in an inscription by a former owner on the verso. Yet despite this, the possibility of another artist participating in a similar life drawing session with the same model is not to be excluded.⁷ This is further suggested by another study of the same figure as in inv. no. RP-T-1880-A-86(R), now in the Maida and George Abrams Collection, Boston,⁸ seen from a slightly different vantage point, more in front of the model. Drawn by an even less skilled unidentified hand, presumably in the same session, it was executed in black rather than red chalk, but shows the figure with the same pose and costume.

As has been suggested for inv. no. RP-T-1880-A-86(R), a date in the late 1650s would seem appropriate for the present sheet. No corresponding motif has been found among Bega’s paintings, though similar types occur repeatedly in his painted oeuvre, as in the Blind Fiddler, signed and dated 1663, in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford (inv. no. WA1897.11).⁹

Annemarie Stefes, 2017