Violin Player with a Wine Glass

Dirck van Baburen was one of the Dutch Caravaggisti who travelled to Rome in the 1610s, absorbed Caravaggio's dramatic chiaroscuro and close-up figural presentation, and brought the resulting manner back to Utrecht — the Dutch city that became the centre of Caravaggesque painting in the north. This 1623 Violin Player with a Wine Glass belongs to his series of half-length musicians and revellers that placed Caravaggesque lighting and bold foreshortening in the service of genre subjects popular with Dutch collectors. Van Baburen's work was admired and collected widely: his painting of a procuress was owned by the family of Jan Vermeer and appears in two of Vermeer's interior scenes, making him an unexpected link between the raw naturalism of the Caravaggisti and the refined intimacy of the Delft master.

Van Baburen employs the Utrecht Caravaggesque format: the figure cut off at chest height by the picture edge, lit from a single strong lateral source that models the face and hands in warm light against deep shadow. The violin is painted with tactile detail, its wood grain carefully observed.