Let justice be done to Rombouts!

About the Caravaggio work of Theodoor Rombouts and the monographic exhibition devoted to him at the Ghent Museum of Fine Arts.

"The gods of painting are sometimes cruel. You have to be devious to have a brilliant artist born in the same city and at the same time as Rubens and Van Dyck. As Isabelle Manca-Kunert wrote for the magazine L'Oeil in its April issue, "it is difficult, even for the most talented painter, not to see his star overshadowed by these two giants, all the more so in a historiographical tradition that has long favoured biographical and hagiographical accounts. Thus, apart from the most seasoned amateurs of 17th century painting, who still knows the work of Theodoor Rombouts? Nevertheless, during his lifetime, the leading representative of Flemish Caravaggism had no difficulty in finding takers for his works of art for sale! Van Dyck himself praised his talent as a 'painter of Antwerp human figures'. But although his painting was highly regarded during his short life, his artistic legacy was quickly forgotten after his early death.

It took the recently completed major exhibition at the Ghent Museum of Fine Arts in Belgium to bring Theodoor Rombouts back (somewhat) into the limelight. "This lack of notoriety is not new, but it occurred quickly after his death in 1637, at the age of barely 40," notes the journalist. For even if he is undeniably less well known than Rubens or Van Dyck, his works are no less important in Flemish art. The ambition of the Ghent Museum of Fine Arts (MSK) was to demonstrate this through the exhibition "Theodoor Rombouts, Virtuoso of Flemish Caravaggio", the first monographic exhibition ever devoted to him, which was held from 21 January to 23 April 2023. A fine way to celebrate the 225th anniversary of the museum.

Finally, a surprising and new overview of the artist was offered. For the first time, visitors were able to discover the essence of the painter's work in dialogue with works by eminent contemporaries such as Bartolomeo Manfredi (1582-1622), Valentin de Boulogne (1591-1632) and Hendrick ter Brugghen (1588-1629). Thanks to a thematic arrangement and a number of prestigious loans, the exhibition covered the many aspects of Rombouts' painting, bringing us closer to the man behind the work: an intelligent artist who willingly allowed himself to be seduced by the talent of his colleagues, which did not prevent him from developing his own artistic identity that was perfectly recognisable to his clientele at the time and to us today.

Caravaggism was particularly well known in Antwerp, Flanders, where many artists, including Theodoor Rombouts, promoted this pictorial trend, which was derived from the work of Caravaggio and is characterised by the realism of the representations and the vigour of the contrasts of light and shade. Born in Antwerp in 1597, Theodoor Rombouts mainly painted secular works as well as a few altarpieces, responding to numerous civil commissions. The contemporary art market of the time was very fond of his paintings. His monumental genre scenes painted on horizontal canvases caused a sensation, at least in the case of the first ones, in the tradition of his master Abraham Janssens, with whom he began training at the age of 11. Janssens was one of the first Flemish artists to paint in a style influenced by Caravaggio combined with strong classicist tendencies. Rombouts then packed his bags and headed for Italy, the Mecca of modern art, and particularly Rome, where he left the mark of the great Italian Baroque master on his work, with whom he shared a taste for contrast and chiaroscuro.

"Fascinated by Caravaggio and his most illustrious follower Manfredi, Rombouts unreservedly embraced the aesthetic revolution of chiaroscuro and naturalism that was shaking up the whole of Europe," writes Isabelle Manca-Kunert. "Although he adopted the style and themes that were flourishing, he did not confine himself to slavish copies, but invented his own personal style incorporating typically Rubenian accents. He is especially noted for his virtuosity in still lifes, which became his trademark. Just like the eminently personal palette he developed, with its emphasis on bright colours. His characters wear sumptuous red, purple or blue costumes. Details that became the signature of this son of a Flemish tailor, whose customers were then snatching up his paintings... "

Rombouts was the first Flemish painter who, like Gerrit van Honthorst in the Dutch Republic, painted single male and female musicians. In The Lute Player, for example, painted in 1625 and loaned by the Philadelphia Museum of Art for the Ghent exhibition, the faithful depiction of instruments and objects, such as the mug and music books in the foreground, remains fascinating. This painting for sale was so successful in its day that Rombouts produced at least a dozen versions! He also often collaborated with other Flemish masters, such as Adriaen van Utrecht, for whom he added figures to his still life compositions.

The Lute Player, Michelangelo Merisi, known as Caravaggio

The figures in his Allegory of the Five Senses are the reason for the success of the famous oil on canvas that he painted in 1632. The Ghent Museum made no mistake when it bought the work of art in 1860: it has become a public favourite! It must be said that it is truly original for an early work of art: the painter replaced the female allegories with colourful male figures, whose attributes illustrate each of the senses and are intended to convey a moral meaning. Thus Theodoor Rombouts, who is virtually unknown today, has revolutionised the allegorical genre!

It is also said that the painter even portrayed himself in the guise of the charlatan in The Tooth Puller, an oil on canvas dating from 1628 that is also part of the permanent collection of the Ghent Museum, and which takes up the famous subject of the tooth puller immortalised by Caravaggio in the Rombouts style. The violent and bloody nature of the episode is thus erased here to give a more anecdotal and less sombre character to this superb still life composed of instruments of torture and diseased teeth. For, like his illustrious Italian master, the Flemish painter delights in popular and trivial scenes. Perhaps even offering himself a tasty self-portrait in this one!

Illustration:

The Lute Player, Michelangelo Merisi, known as Caravaggio, 1595-1596 - Saint Petersburg, The State Hermitage Museum/P. Demidov