Collection Jörgen B. Hartmann, Rome, en 1954 ;

Galerie De Jonckheere, Paris ;

Collection particulière, Brescia, en 1998 ;

Galerie De Jonckheere, Paris ;

Acquis auprès de cette dernière par les parents des actuels propriétaires en 2008 ;

Collection particulière, France

Korneel Goossens, David Vinckboons, Anvers-La Haye, 1954, p. 106-107, fig. 57 (comme David Vinckboons)

Klaus Ertz, in cat. exp. Pieter Breughel le Jeune - Jan Brueghel l'Ancien. Une famille de peintres flamands vers 1600, Essen - Vienne - Anvers, Lingen, 1998, mentionné dans la notice du n° 145, p. 402, note 3

Klaus Ertz, Pieter Brueghel der Jüngere (1564-1637/38). Die Gemälde mit kritischem Oeuvrekatalog, Lingen, 2000, t. II, p. 741-744, fig. 586 et p. 761, n° E 1024

Klaus Ertz et Christa Nitze-Ertz, David Vinckboons 1576-1632. Monographie mit kritischem Katalog der Zeichnungen und Gemälde, Lingen, 2016, p. 62, fig. 79 (comme Pieter Brueghel le Jeune)

A man in ragged clothes playing the bagpipes is followed by a horde of young children. In front of him, a young boy is shown on his knees in front of a little girl, who is more richly dressed and who holds a sculpted wooden rod. This is a stick (kolfstok) used to play kolf, the forerunner of golf, which was often played on ice. On the right, a young woman with a basket is collecting alms from the villagers. In the background, other villagers are busy taming an ox. Various children are playing while a man draws water from the well. This scene captures the essence of the art of Pieter Brueghel II: a composition full of humour and dynamism.

Long attributed to David Vinckboons (1576-1629), Klaus Ertz in his catalogue raisonné links the present panel to the oeuvre of Pieter Brueghel II. The theme of the musician walking through a village surrounded by many children is common to the work of both Pieter Brueghel II and David Vinckboons. The same subject of the piper is depicted by David Vinckboons in a painting monogrammed lower right and dated 16(0?)6 (oil on panel, 43 x 73.5 cm, New York, Sotheby's, 10 January 1991, no. 41, fig. 1), the date of which is partially effaced so that it is not possible to tell whether it is a 0 or a 1 or even a 2, making it difficult to establish whether Pieter Brueghel or David Vinckboons was responsible for the composition. At the time of the sale, Korneel Goossens suggested that our work was another unsigned version of the Vinckboons painting, and dated it to around 1607. Influenced by the work of Pieter Brueghel I, several of the elements in our painting are recurrent in the drawings of David Vinckboons, such as the beggars and the ragged figures surrounded by children. Although the two works are very similar in composition, certain details differ. The foliage of the trees, the shape of the branches and the cladding of the pigsty are not treated in the same way in the two panels.

In 2000, Klaus Ertz discussed this attribution at length after examining our panel. For him, there was no doubt that the work was painted by Pieter Brueghel II, whose precise style and particularly vivid palette he recognised. Unlike Brueghel II, David Vinckboons used muted tones in a cameo of browns. He also believed that Pieter II was responsible for the painting because of the execution and the figures in the background, which are unmistakable in the Flemish painter's work. The scene is to be placed in the wake of the representations of rustic landscapes initiated by Pieter Brueghel the father, from whom the son constantly drew inspiration. The theme of villagers gathered around a musician is thus depicted several times in the work of the Brueghel dynasty.

The popular success of this composition is attested to by other versions featuring a blind hurdy-gurdy player also surrounded by children, painted by both Pieter Brueghel II (1) and David Vinckboons (2). These works shed light on the circulation of Brueghelian prototypes used by different artists working at the same time, and on the question of originality, which was not a criterion to be taken into account by painters of the period. Pieter Brueghel II also painted other similar subjects, such as The Whitsun Bride (a version of which is in the Gemäldegalerie, Schloss Georgium, Dessau), which depicts another scene set in a village in Flanders in the early 17th century (3).

1.   Klaus Ertz, Pieter Brueghel der Jüngere (1564-1637/38). Die Gemälde mit kritischem Oeuvrekatalog, Lingen, 2000, p. 761-763.

2.   See Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum, SK-A-2401.

3.   Ertz, op. cit., p. 764-765. A version painted by David Vinckboons was sold in one of our salesrooms (Anonymous sale, Paris, Artcurial, 22 November 2023, n° 155).