Is it possible some of these left-handed designs derive from [a] the
artist knowing nothing of the lute, and working from their
imagination
In relation to the "Dutch theorbo painting online", the painting
does appear to carefully represent the broken strings, and I would be
very surprised if the painter had gone to all that trouble, just to
represent in detail the defects of the 'stage props', although I
agree with Kenneth Spar that a great deal of caution is needed when
attempting to interpret such symbolism, in the context of the period.
In the same way, the luthenist model could just by chance have been
left-handed, and the artist, as you suggest, knowing nothing about
lutes, could have carefully represented this; but here again, I
imagine this could also be the result of a deliberate choice by the
painter, and part of the intended symbolism. The artist may have
deliberately chosen a left-handed model, who would hold the lute the
wrong way up.
If you look on the covers of Lute News issues 63 and 64 you'll see
two
Dutch tile designs showing left handed players.
[b] the use of camera obscura in painting, resulting in a reversed
image?
Could tiles have sometimes been made by a printing technique that
inversed the image, or if not, have been copied from an engraving
process that does do this (negative to positive)?
In respect to this question, there was a similar topic raised, a year
or so ago, about the inverted 12c lute in the well known engraving of
Jacques Gautier. The problem being that while the lute is possibly
inversed, the text below is not.
David Van Edwards obviously considered that this image was inversed,
so he corrected this on his site, as we can see when comparing this
to the original with that of the RA:
Compare :
D.V.E.
http://tinyurl.com/yt8ovw
the RA
http://tinyurl.com/yvfn5z
The reason for inversing such an image could be, as Roman Turovsky
suggested, the engraver taking a short-cut, and etching a positive
(rather than a negative) which results in a final reversed image. On
the other hand, it is also possible that the engraver found the
inversed image with Jacques placed at the left looking to the right
somehow more powerful, or more in keeping with the myth of Orpheos .
He may not have cared about the inversed lute.
In the case of a painting, as you have suggested, an inversed image
could be the result of using a camera obscura;
One quite famous example of a partially inverted image, is this
rendering of Criccieth Castle, by Turner.
He was known to have used camera obscura, but why did he only inverse
the Castle, and not the scenery?
http://tinyurl.com/2aj2j9
Compare with my own photo taken towards Criccieth Castle at sunset:
http://tinyurl.com/2bf8fa
It is generally considered that, by inversing the castle, Turner
increases the feeling of the wildness of the sea, against which the
castle is now facing.
This does not preclude the possibility that he used a camera obscura
for this part of the image.
It is true that too much can be read into a painting or engraving,
which could be the result of some accidental cause; on the other
hand, it may be that we are missing the painter's intentions, because
at present we lack the key to understand it.
Anthony
Le 10 mai 09 à 09:22, lute...@aol.com a écrit :
If you look on the covers of Lute News issues 63 and 64 you'll
see two
Dutch tile designs showing left handed players.
Is it possible some of these left-handed designs derive from [a]
the
artist knowing nothing of the lute, and working from their
imagination
[b] the use of camera obscura in painting, resulting in a reversed
image?
best wishes
Chris Goodwin
In a message dated 09/05/2009 22:15:52 GMT Standard Time,
chriswi...@yahoo.com writes:
David,
--- On Fri, 5/8/09, David van Ooijen <davidvanooi...@gmail.com>
wrote:
From: David van Ooijen <davidvanooi...@gmail.com>
Subject: [BAROQUE-LUTE] Re: Dutch theorbo painting online
To: baroque-l...@cs.dartmouth.edu
Date: Friday, May 8, 2009, 5:39 PM
On Fri, May 8, 2009 at 11:08 PM,
<wi...@cs.helsinki.fi> wrote:
And upside down, at that.
And now we all "HIP" oriented lutenists have
to turn our extended lutes
the other way round: the painting gives certainly
clear rules on how to
I _knew_ I was right! Now all I have to do is get a right
handed
theorbo/Dutch lute/English theorbo. Breaking strings also
comes
natural to me, so who's the HIPest lute player in town?
;-)
I'm afraid not. The painting is obviously a morality tale
warning
against the evils of left handed playing. As contemporary
viewers
would have known, the broken strings symbolize the folly of
all who
succumb to the temptation of this wicked vice. Even the
correct-handed, virtuous gamba player's instrument is dragged
down
into iniquity by the very presence of the literally sinister-
minded
girl, as shown by the broken string. Sorry David, I'm afraid the
meaning of the symbolism is quite irrefutable on this one.
You're
not HIP, just evil. ;-)
In all seriousness - WERE there even left handed people around at
this time and in this culture? Before my time I'm told, kids in
American schools were ALL forced to write with the right
hand. Left
handedness was not tolerated. Perhaps the very presence of a
left
handed person actually means something in this pic?
Chris (who's got a left-handed guitar playin' wife)
--
*******************************
David van Ooijen
davidvanooi...@gmail.com
www.davidvanooijen.nl
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