Lute Player
The greatest French follower of Caravaggio, Valentin was one of the most outstanding foreign artists working in seventeenth‑century Rome. He frequently depicted scenes of music‑making, drinking, and fortune‑telling in the characteristically direct, vivid manner seen here. This image of a young soldier singing a love madrigal is unique in Valentin’s career and is perhaps emblematic of the sobriquet he took in Rome: Amador, a Spanish word for "lover boy." In the 1650s, this painting was in the collection of Cardinal Mazarin, Louis XIV’s powerful chief minister.
Artwork Details
- Title: Lute Player
- Artist: Valentin de Boulogne (French, Coulommiers-en-Brie 1591–1632 Rome)
- Date: ca. 1625–26
- Medium: Oil on canvas
- Dimensions: 50 1/2 x 39 in. (128.3 x 99.1 cm)
- Classification: Paintings
- Credit Line: Purchase, Walter and Leonore Annenberg Acquisitions Endowment Fund; Director's Fund; Acquisitions Fund; James and Diane Burke and Mark Fisch and Rachel Davidson Gifts; Louis V. Bell, Harris Brisbane Dick, Fletcher, and Rogers Funds and Joseph Pulitzer Bequest, 2008
- Object Number: 2008.459
- Curatorial Department: European Paintings
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5200. The Lute Player
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