A dinner party: a young man plays the lute while a young woman puts a piece of meat into the mouth of the man at the head of the table. Etching by Vivant Denon, 1793, after G. Honthorst.

  • Honthorst, Gerrit van, 1592-1656.
Date:
1793
Reference:
2474494i
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Description

"... the Supper party with a lute player ... aptly referred to by the contemporary connoisseur Giulio Mancini as 'una Cena di buffonerie'. Whether it is a brothel scene, like his later Munich Happy company/Prodigal son ..., painted in lighter colours in 1622, is open to question, since it was painted for Cosimo II, Grand Duke of Tuscany. The costumes are less revealing than in his other bordello scenes, and the old woman is more of a servant than a procuress. As for what is being shoved into the right hand drinker's mouth, Papi's ingenious suggestion that it is a cloth to wrap a broken tooth, though consistent with a folklorish association between toothache and love, does not take account of the fact that in the preparatory drawing in Grenoble it is spaghetti or maccheroni. So perhaps it is, after all, pasta or a slice of ham"--Gash, op. cit., p. 375

Publication/Creation

1793

Physical description

1 print : etching ; platemark 22 x 30.3 cm

Lettering

Denon f.t Florence 1793

References note

Marcel Roux, Inventaire du fonds français, graveurs du XVIIIe siècle, Bibliothèque nationale, Département des estampes, tome VI, Paris 1949, p. 556, Denon no. 200 ("200. Repas de courtisanes, d'après G. Honthorst. Demi-figures. A g., un homme, assis de profil à dr., ouvre la bouche pour recevoir un morceau que lui tend une femme au bout d'une fourchette; autour de la table, de g. à dr., sont assis, tous coiffés d'une toque à plume, un joueur de guitare, deux femmes et, au premier plan à dr., un homme vu de dos et riant, le verre en main. Signé, sous le tr. c, à dr.: 'Denon f Florence 1793'. H. 0m195 x L. 0m280. 2 épr., l'une sur papier pelure, et une contrépr. …. Catalogue de 1803 [Catalogue des estampes gravées par le citoyen D. Vivant Denon (Paris: Calcographie du Musée central des Arts, Ventôse an XI-1803], p. 4 (sous le titre : Plusieurs figures autour d'une table), 1 fr. 20. Le tableau est reproduit sous le titre ci-dessus dans la Galerie de Florence de Wicar (tome II).")
John Gash, 'Honthorst--Florence', The Burlington magazine, May 2015, 157: 374-376

Reference

Wellcome Collection 2474494i

Reproduction note

A sketch by Denon after a painting by Honthorst in the Uffizi, Florence

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