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We have a early string instrument (Lute) in the center of the painting. The lute is being played accurately. There is someone hole a box. The box that one man is holding contains extra strings and there is a handkerchief there to wipe his hands. It is very realistic

Torri Harris
Megan Ostrat
Conner Garmon

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This is a large gathering and it seems like they are up high, because of the railing we see. We guess that they are welcoming someone to their place. Music could be used here to impress people and show their scholarliness. The instruments depicted here are horns, trumpet, drum and flute.

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The Marriage Feast at Cana, c.1562                                 Paolo Veronese (Caliari) 

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The Marriage Feast at Cana, c.1562                                 Paolo Veronese (Caliari) 

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Erin Lamb, Kelley Monahan, Madison Golden

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Master of the Female Half-Lengths, Dutch Northern Renaissance Painter, ca. 1530-1540

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Master of the Female Half-Lengths, Dutch Northern Renaissance Painter, ca. 1530-1540

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Common family/friends activity as the three female figures are gathered closely around the table. The music book is open in the center of the table and they are all peered down at it, appearing to read the sheet music. They are all extremely attentive and focused. It almost appears as if a music lesson is being taught. The figure in the back left is looking on with the females as well.

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This picture shows four young men two older, two younger. The older two boys seem to be teaching the younger more jovial boys how to play. It seems that the level of education class attributed to the skills in musicality. Learning how to play instruments was a very important skill set.
(Wyatt)

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Master of the Female Half-Lengths (Unknown Southern Netherland Artist, previously attributed to Pieter Pourbus, c. 1524)

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Master of the Female Half-Lengths (Unknown Southern Netherland Artist, previously attributed to Pieter Pourbus, c. 1524)

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Three young ladies are playing music with a jester leaning over their shoulders and looking on adoringly. The image of the jester, of course, suggests merriment, but the girls appear intent on the music and completely unaware of him. They seem to be at ease and enjoying themselves in a pleasant and casual way as seen by their small smiles. The fact that the jester is in such close personal quarters with the ladies also suggests that this is a prescriptive painting. - Kassie

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Mary, Queen of Heaven (Master of the Saint Lucy Legend, 1485/1500)

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Mary, Queen of Heaven (Master of the Saint Lucy Legend, 1485/1500)

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The woman in the middle is the virgin Mary who is surrounded by a bunch of loud instruments (trumpets and shawms) and soft instruments (vielle, lute, and harp). Mary is also being held up in a high regard as she is literally being held up by angels. She is also depicted as the Queen of Heaven.The music that inspired the creation of this piece is Walter Frye's "Ave Regina Caelorum"

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Overview

This unusually large panel painting depicts three facets of Marian iconography: the Virgin's corporeal assumption, the Immaculate Conception-the crescent moon and the radiance behind her identify Mary as the Woman of the Apocalyse, mentioned in Revelation 12:I-and the Coronation of the Virgin. The painting is of great interest to musicologists in that it depicts Renaissance instruments with great accuracy and also reflects contemporary performance practices in the arrangement of the music-making angels. At the top, a full orchestra plays before the three figures of the Trinity. The ensemble around the Virgin is a mixed consort composed of "loud" instruments (trumpets and shawms) and "soft" instruments (vielle, lute, and harp). Two of the singing angels hold books bearing legible lyrics and notations. This music, which is the source of the painting's title, has been identified as derived from a setting of the Marian antiphon, Ave Regina Caelorum, by Walter Frye (d. 1474/1475), an English composer whose works were popular on the Continent, particularly at the Burgundian court.

Historians refer to the artist as the Master of the Saint Lucy Legend because his principal work, an alterpiece dated 1480, depicts episodes from the life of that saint. His style is characterized in both paintings by oval faces that are restrained in expression, the use of extraordinarily intense color, and a tendency to over-emphasize elaborate textures.

More information on this painting can be found in the Gallery publication Early Netherlandish Painting, which is available as a free PDF https://www.nga.gov/content/dam/ngaweb/research/publications/pdfs/early-netherlandish-painting.pdf

Inscription

on the sheet of music held by the angel to the left of the Virgin's head: A / ve regina celorum mr regis[?]; on the sheet of music held by the angel to the right of the Virgin's head: A / Tenor ve / regina

Provenance

Probably Don Pedro Fernández de Velasco, Count of Haro and Constable of Castile [d. 1492], for the convent of Santa Clara, Medina de Pomar, near Burgos, until at least 1934.[1] Raimundo Ruiz y Ruiz, Madrid.[2] (French & Company, New York, by c. 1947); purchased 1949 by the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, New York; gift 1952 by exchange to NGA.

Exhibition History

2016

A Feast for the Senses: Art and Experience in Medieval Europe, Walters Art Museum, Baltimore; The John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art, Sarasota, 2016-2017, no. 42, repro. (shown only in Sarasota in 2017).

Technical Summary

The support consists of six boards with vertical grain. X-radiographs show that the joins are reinforced with dowels. A smooth white ground is present.[1] The presence of a barbe on all sides indicates that the panel is very close to its original size and was painted in an engaged frame. In general, the painting is in very good condition, but there are numerous small losses throughout and somewhat larger losses in the upper paint layers of the landscape. Some retouches have darkened. Examination with infrared reflectography reveals extensive underdrawing, discussed below. The painting was cleaned and restored in 1950-1951 and a very small area of flaking paint was restored in 1962.

[1] Kress 1951, 182, states that the paint was applied directly to the panel without an intervening ground; this error is repeated by Walker 1963, 106, but corrected in Eisler 1977, 63, n. 6.

Bibliography

1960

Broadley Hugh T. Flemish Painting in the National Gallery of Art (Booklet no. 5 in Ten Schools of Painting in the National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC). Washington, 1960: 26-27, color repro.

1963

Winternitz, Emanuel. "On Angel Concerts in the 15th Century: A Critical Approach to Realism and Symbolism in Sacred Painting." The Musical Quarterly 49 (1963): 263, 459-460, pl. 5. (Reprinted as Musical Instruments and their Symbolism in Western Art New York, 1967: 145-149, pl. 66, 67).

1968

European Paintings and Sculpture: Illustrations (Companion to the Summary Catalogue, 1965). Washington, 1968: 76, no. 1096, repro.

1977

Eisler, Colin. Paintings from the Samuel H. Kress Collection: European Schools Excluding Italian. Oxford, 1977: 61-63, figs. 54, 55, as The Assumption and Coronation of the Immaculately Conceived Virgin by The Master of the St. Lucy Legend and Assistant, color repro detail.

1977

Pope-Hennessy, John. "Completing the Account." Review of Colin Eisler, Paintings from the Samuel H. Kress Collection, London 1977. Times Literary Supplement no. 3,927 (17 June 1977).

1982

Roberts, Ann. "The Master of the Legend of Saint Lucy: A Cataloque and Critical Essay." Ph.D. dissertation, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, 1982: 92-95, 154-159, 185, 190, 194, 202-207, 219-222, cat. no. 7, figs. 13, 14.

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Overview This unusually large panel painting depicts three facets of Marian iconography: the Virgin's corporeal assumption, the Immaculate Conception-the crescent moon and the radiance behind her identify Mary as the Woman of the Apocalyse, mentioned in Revelation 12:I-and the Coronation of the Virgin.

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The Musicians

Italian: Concerto di giovani

Artist
Caravaggio

Year

c. 1595

Medium

Oil on canvas

Dimensions

92 cm × 118.5 cm (36 in × 46.7 in)

Location

Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City

The Musicians or Concert of Youths (c. 1595) is a painting by the Italian Baroque master Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio (1571-1610). It is held in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, where it has been since 1952. It underwent extensive restoration in 1983.

Caravaggio entered the household of Cardinal Francesco Maria Del Monte sometime in 1595, and The Musicians is thought to have been his first painting done expressly for the cardinal. His biographer, the painter Baglione, says he "painted for the Cardinal youths playing music very well drawn from nature and also a youth playing a lute," the latter presumably being The Lute Player, which seems to form a companion-piece to The Musicians.

The picture shows four boys in quasi-Classical costume, three playing various musical instruments or singing, the fourth dressed as Cupid and reaching towards a bunch of grapes. The picture is an allegory relating music to the sustenance of love in the same way that food is the sustenance of life.

Caravaggio seems to have composed the painting from studies of two figures. The central figure with the lute has been identified with Caravaggio's companion Mario Minniti, and the individual next to him and facing the viewer is possibly a self-portrait of the artist. The cupid bears a strong resemblance to the boy in Boy Peeling Fruit, done a few years before, and also to the angel in Saint Francis of Assisi in Ecstasy.

The manuscripts show that the boys are practicing madrigals celebrating love, and the eyes of the lutenist, the principal figure, are moist with tears-the songs presumably describe the sorrow of love rather than its pleasures. The violin in the foreground suggests a fifth participant, implicitly including the viewer in the tableau.

Scenes showing musicians were a popular theme at the time-the Church was supporting a revival of music and new styles and forms were being tried, especially by educated and progressive prelates such as Del Monte. This scene, however, is clearly secular rather than religious, and harks back to the long-established tradition of "concert" pictures, a genre originating in Venice and exemplified, in its earlier form, by Titian's Le concert champêtre.

This was Caravaggio's most ambitious and complex composition to date, and the artist has evidently had difficulties with painting the four figures separately-they don't relate to each other or to the picture-space, and the overall effect is somewhat clumsy. The painting is in poor condition, and the music in the manuscript has been badly damaged by past restorations, although a tenor and an alto part can be made out. Nevertheless, despite considerable paint loss, the work's originality remains undimmed.

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The Musicians Italian: Concerto di giovani Artist Caravaggio Year c. 1595 Medium Oil on canvas Dimensions 92 cm × 118.5 cm (36 in × 46.7 in) Location Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City The Musicians or Concert of Youths (c. 1595) is a painting by the Italian Baroque master Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio (1571-1610).