Self-Portrait with Magic Scene
Pieter van Laer
(Haarlem 1599 – 1642 Italy?)ca. 1635–37
oil on canvas
80 x 114.9 cm
signed on the music sheet, lower left center: “P.V.
Laer”
PvL-100

How to cite
Liedtke, Walter A. and Arthur K. Wheelock Jr. “Self-Portrait with Magic Scene” (2017). Revised by Alexa J. McCarthy(2019). In The Leiden Collection Catalogue, 3rd ed. Edited by Arthur K. Wheelock Jr. and Lara Yeager-Crasselt. New
York, 2020–23. https://www.theleidencollection.com/archive/ (archived December 2023).
A PDF of every version of this entry is available in this Online Catalogue's Archive, and the Archive is managed by apermanent URL. New versions are added only when a substantive change to the narrative occurs.

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In one of the most remarkable self-portraits ever created, Pieter van Laer reacts with

Comparative Figureshorror to the frightening claws of the devil that have suddenly come to claim him.
Dressed in the black cloak and cap of a magician, the artist, with bulging eyes andopen mouth, has witnessed this apparition while standing behind a table filled withbooks, some with alchemical notations, a variety of vessels, a snuffed-out candle, anda skull resting on hot coals. To emphasize the personal character of this dramatic
image, Van Laer prominently signed this work on the musical score lying in theforeground, its lyrics warning that “the devil doesn’t jest.” Clearly, in his conjuring up
a world of occult forces, the magician has unleashed realms far beyond his control,and he is about to suffer the consequences of his audacity.
The magician’s identification as Van Laer is without question. His appearance is best
known from a moody self-portrait in the Uffizi, Florence (fig 1).[1] That work, which
probably dates about 1632–33, records a number of distinctive features similar to
those in the present picture: a broad, brushy, upturned mustache, a short beard, a slim
nose with a rounded tip, widely arching eyebrows, and a shaggy haircut flaring

Fig 1. Pieter van Laer, Self-Portrait,ca. 1632–33, oil on panel, 72 x 58 cm,
Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence, ©
2015, Photo Scala, Florence, courtesyof the Ministero Beni e Att. Culturali

sideways at the ears.
The darkness of the scene, which is partially lit by a metal oil lamp hanging in theupper left, and the strange array of objects on the magician’s table denote Van Laer’s
macabre fascination with the underworld. The extinguished candle in the center of thepicture has burned halfway down, perhaps suggesting the arrival of death midway
through the course of one’s life. A thin trail of smoke rising from the upside-downskull, which sits on glowing embers, probably indicates that some unsavory
concoction is being heated in this morbid cooking pot.[2] Various vessels containunidentified liquids—a small mixing bowl filled with a red substance and a squareFig 2. Pieter van Laer, The
Bentveughels in a Roman Tavern, ca.
1630, brown ink and wash on paper,
20.3 x 25.8 cm, Kupferstichkabinet,
Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, inv. 5239

bottle containing a copper-colored fluid—that one can imagine the magician using tocreate his potions. The eeriest of these vessels is the tapered glass with black creatures
crawling on its surface. The creature that resembles a spider in the center foregroundis most likely a deadly scorpion.
The pellets or seeds spilling out of a paper cone in the right foreground could be
another ingredient for the magician’s brew, or perhaps an allusion to the Parable of
the Tares (or Weeds) in Matthew 13:24–30 and 36–43, according to which the devil
sows the seeds of sinful men among the seeds of those who will be saved. The parable
was frequently employed by preachers of the time and was also treated by artists—for
example, by Jacques de Gheyn II (1565–1629) in a drawing of 1603, by Domenico
Fetti (1588/89–1623) in a painting of about 1622, and by Abraham Bloemaert(1566–1651) in a painting of 1624.[3]Fig 3. Gianlorenzo Bernini, The© 2024 The Leiden CollectionSelf-Portrait with Magic Scene
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The books on the table are not identified by authors’ names or titles, which is to be
expected considering their likely content. Publications dealing with occult knowledge

Damned Soul, 1619, marble, Palazzo
di Spagna, Rome

were included among the thousands of works listed in the Index Librorum
Prohibitorum (Index of Prohibited Books), which was frequently updated by theCongregation of the Index, the pope, and the Holy Office of the Inquisition; any
knowledge of them could have landed Van Laer in difficult circumstances. The
handwritten markings on the end of the largest book may be the artist’s approximationof Hebrew letters or a magical alphabet, suggesting heretical or esoteric ideas.[4] Thesymbols in the open book appear to be associated with magic and witchcraft, although
the exact meanings of most of them are no longer understood.[5] The five-pointed
inverted pentagram, however, represents the devil.[6] The pierced heart likely suggests
suffering (especially from love), grief, or death. As is common in alchemical scenesof the seventeenth century, the individual motifs and symbols do not add up to acoherent message but rather create an atmosphere of illicit pursuits.

Fig 4. Angelo Caroselli, La
Negromante, ca. 1625, oil on canvas,
44 x 35 cm, Pinacoteca Civica “F.
Podesti” – Ancona

The prominent sheet of music that contains the artist’s signature is identified as a
“Canon a 3 [voci]” (canon, or round, for three voices), specifically three tenors,
according to the key indicated on the staff. Van Laer’s canon appears to be composed
either in the Phrygian mode, which descends in a sequence called a “diabolus inmusica,” or as the sketch of a “crab canon” (canon cancrizans), in which two musicallines reverse each other.[7] The crab is known for its back and forth movement, just as
the devil runs counter to the divine plan.[8] In either case, the lyrics, “il diavolo noburla no il diav . . . a” (the devil doesn’t jest no the devil . . .), leave no doubt as to thewarning that the painting conveys.

Fig 5. Pietro Paolini, Negromante, ca.
1630, oil on canvas, 70 x 93 cm,
Collezione Cavallini Sgarbi, Ferrara

Although this painting is primarily concerned with the occult and witchcraft, it hascertain resonances with alchemy. The alchemist’s labors were intimately bound to thestudy and early practice of chemistry, and a huge amount of literature evolved in thesixteenth and seventeenth centuries explaining the types of physical matter and theprocesses by which one could conduct experiments to transform one element intoanother. It was, for many, a respectable profession, and its scholarly component isevident in the list of significant scientists who sought to separate the essence ofmatter from its base components, among them Robert Boyle (1627–91) and Sir Isaac
Newton (1642–1727).[9] Many alchemists made significant scientific contributions to
the development of, among other items, medicines and cosmetics, as well as pigments
and dyes. Nevertheless, alchemy’s ambiguous status in popular culture derived fromits origins in natural philosophy, metaphysics, and religion. Alchemists were secretive
about the processes that allowed them to make their transformations, and their texts
and treatises utilized a wide range of occult signs and symbols similar to those seen in
the open manuscript in Van Laer’s haunting painting.

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Too little is known of Van Laer’s life to fully understand the psychologicalunderpinnings that undoubtedly impacted this terrifying vision and drove him to paintit. Perhaps his interest in witchcraft derived from his deformed body—hunchbacked
with a lower body three times larger than his torso. In Rome, where he painted thiswork in the mid-1630s, he was known as “il Bamboccio” (clumsy puppet) because of
his stunted torso. In his day, exposure to witchcraft was often said (especially byeager Inquisitors) to result in physical deformity.
Van Laer had a successful career in Rome, but he also seems to have lived a raucous
life as part of a group of Netherlandish artists, the Schildersbent (painters’ group), whocalled themselves Bentvueghels (usually translated as “birds of a feather,” but in thiscase meaning “The Bent Flock”). The fraternity was known for its frolicsome
meetings in taverns, especially its bacchic initiation rites and its antagonistic stancetoward the high-minded Accademia di San Luca. This community of artists, however,also seems to have shared in Van Laer’s fascination with the occult. This interest isseen in an intriguing painting by Van Laer’s brother, Roeland van Laer (1598–ca.
1635), from around 1626, that depicts the Bentvueghels wildly drinking andperforming a tableau vivant in a tavern during some sort of initiation rite.[10]Graffiti—including proverbs, exhortations, a depiction of a flaming heart pierced byan arrow, and the same musical score that Pieter van Laer included in his
painting—covers the back wall of the room. Interestingly, Roeland signed his painting
on that score, just as Pieter would later do in Self-Portrait with Magic Scene.[11]In about 1630 Pieter van Laer made a fascinating drawing of the Bentveughels in atavern, which also includes motifs also relevant to the present painting (fig 2).[12] The
drawing depicts members of the Bentveughels drinking, smoking, playing
backgammon, and vocalizing in a room decorated with numerous line drawings on theback wall. Two figures stand apart from the revelers, one pointing at the word
“BAMBOO” (an abbreviation for Bamboccio), and the other leaning against the backwall. Between them two drawings on the back wall depict Van Laer, one a geometriccartoon of his short figure as seen from behind and the other a caricature of his headin profile. Ominously, however, on the right side of the wall is a drawing of a large
skeleton (Death) holding up an hourglass, and next to it a large, full-length horned
figure with satyr’s legs and wings holding out a claw-like hand not unlike theoutstretched claws in the painting.[13] The overall appearance of this creature is incomplete accord with contemporary illustrations of the devil, such as those in the1608 “book of witches,” titled Compendium Maleficarum, by the Italian priest
Guaccius (Francesco Maria Guazzo).[14] This macabre juxtaposition of a festive
gathering with drawings of Death and the devil suggests that complex feelings andemotions were ingrained in the lives of the Bentvueghels, not just in Van Laer’s
experience.
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Van Laer’s self-portrait shares an interest in rendering the passions then current in
Italian and Netherlandish studios in Rome. Caravaggio (1571–1610), in particular,
was fascinated by the challenge of depicting the emotions of fear and surprise.[15] Van
Laer would have known and admired Caravaggio’s Boy Bitten by a Lizard of about
1593–94 (National Gallery, London); Head of Medusa, of 1596–98 (Uffizi,
Florence); the astonished Assyrian in Judith and Holofernes, of about 1598–99(Palazzo Barberini, Rome); and his later David with the Head of Goliath, of 1605–10(Galleria Borghese, Rome).[16] One of the most important antecedents for Van Laer’s
screaming self-portrait was probably the famous marble bust by Gianlorenzo Bernini(1598–1680), The Damned Soul of 1619 (fig 3), in which the artist also employed his
own features in his representation of a mortal on his way to hell.[17]Paintings from the 1620s and early 1630s depicting scenes of the occult by Angelo
Caroselli (1585–1653) and his student and collaborator Pietro Paolini (1603–81) musthave also influenced Van Laer.[18] Caroselli and Paolini, who worked together inRome in the 1620s, painted necromancers, or practitioners of black magic, whose
facial expressions are reminiscent of Caravaggio’s Boy Bitten by a Lizard.[19] Their
depictions of the occult reflect Bartolomeo Manfredi’s (1582–1622) manner ofpainting genre scenes, which are imbued with emotion, fantastic elements, andmoralistic undertones.[20] The influence of this pictorial tradition is strikingly evident
in Van Laer’s self-portrait.
In Caroselli’s paintings, female necromancers express fear as they recoil with raised
hands, open mouths, and furrowed brows.[21] For example, the sorceress in his
Negromante of about 1625 (fig 4) exclaims in terror as she turns away from thespindly claws that enter the composition at left. These claws would have been
understood as manifestations of the evil spirit invoked by the ritual.[22] In theforeground, a skull rests upon burning embers beside an open book displaying
symbols of the occult. A lit candle protrudes from the center of a geometric diagramon one page that likely represents a maze or labyrinth.[23] Behind the necromancer, anude figure carries a child toward sacrificial flames, reinforcing the sorceress’s
malevolent intentions.
In his Negromante of about 1630 (fig 5), Paolini reimagined Caroselli’s subject as amale protagonist with outstretched arms, recoiling in fear from claws entering fromthe right.[24] Like Caroselli, Paolini included a skull and a book, a page of which ispartially turned, suggesting that the figure’s pursuit of magic has been interrupted by
the sudden appearance of a clawed specter. The motif of the skull on burning coals,present in all three artists’ compositions, suggests the relationship between the blackarts and death, and also serves as a link between the practitioner and the realm of thespirits.[25] In his rendering of the subject, Van Laer heightened the sense of surprise© 2024 The Leiden CollectionSelf-Portrait with Magic Scene
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and immediacy through virtuosic chiaroscuro, particularly evident in his terrified
expression and the chaotic arrangement of foreboding still-life elements that occupy
the foreground.
No information is known about the original destination of Van Laer’s remarkable selfportrait, but it seems probable that he created this frightening image from some innermotivation rather than to fulfill a commission. Nevertheless, during the earlyseventeenth century a painting like this would have appealed to Van Laer’s Roman
patrons because of the wider artistic interest in intense visual drama and personal
expression. In Rome, as well, the theme of magic as a dangerous temptation wasparticularly apt: in no other city did curiosity about the natural world so often collidewith orthodox belief.[26]- Walter A. Liedtke, Arthur K. Wheelock Jr., 2017; revised Alexa J.
McCarthy, 2019

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Endnotes
1. See Karla Langedijk, Die Selbstbildnisse der holländischen und flämischen Künstler in der Galleria degli
Autoritratti der Uffizien in Florenz (Florence, 1992), 61–63, where Van Laer’s earlier self-portrait in theGalleria Pallavicini, Rome, and other evidence for his appearance are also discussed.
2. Mario G. Genesi, “Per una decodifica dei dettagli magico-musicali nella Scena Magica con Autoritrattodi Pieter Bodding van Laer,” Music in Art 30, nos. 1–2 (2005): 89, suggested that the smoke was fromburning incense.
3. De Gheyn’s drawing is in the Kupferstichkabinet, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin; Bloemaert’s painting is in
the Walters Art Gallery, Baltimore; Fetti’s is in the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid. In the case of
De Gheyn, the subject seems of a piece with several scenes of witchcraft he drew at about the sametime. On this point see Linda C. Hults, The Witch as Muse: Art, Gender, and Power in Early Modern
Europe (Philadelphia, 2005), 152–57.
4. The Kabbalah, along with magic and astrology, was one of the many controversial interests that doomed
Giordano Bruno (burned at the stake in Rome on 17 February 1600), as discussed in Karen Silvia deLeón-Jones, Giordano Bruno and the Kabbalah: Prophets, Magicians, and Rabbis (Lincoln, NE, 2004).
All of Bruno’s writings were placed on the Index in 1603. Similarly, German theologian Heinrich
Cornelius Agrippa von Nettesheim was named a heretic for his De occulta philosophia (1533), in which
he argued that through magic one could come to better understand God and the natural world. In his
analysis, Agrippa drew upon the Hebrew alphabet and Pythagorean numerology, among other sources.
5. The numbers in a column (6?, 4, and 7) could be the beginning of a magic square (in which the numbers
in each column, row, and main diagonal yield the same sum).
6. Kathryn Paulsen, The Complete Book of Magic and Witchcraft (New York, 1980), 149. When the point
is at the top it represents the deity.
7. These alternatives are described in Mario G. Genesi, “Per una decodifica dei dettagli magico-musicali
nella Scena Magica con Autoritratto di Pieter Bodding van Laer,” Music in Art 30, nos. 1–2 (2005):
91–95.
8. As suggested in Laurence Wuidar, “Magie démoniaque et allégorie de l’ouïe: Le canon musical dans lesvanités de Breughel, Natali et Van Laer,” Annales d’histoire de l’art et d’archéologie 27 (2005): 106–7,
where crabs are also said to be associated with love and fortune because of their reversals and conflicts.
9. For this history, see, among others, H.A.M. Snelders, De geschiedenis van de scheikunde in Nederland,
vol. 1, Van alchemie tot chemie en chemische industrie rond 1900 (Delft, 1993), 11–25; Lawrence M.
Principe and Lloyd DeWitt, Transmutations—Alchemy in Art: Selected Works from the Eddleman andFisher Collections at the Chemical Heritage Foundation (Philadelphia, 2002); and Lawrence M. Principe,
The Secrets of Alchemy (Chicago, 2013), especially chapter 5: “The Golden Age: Practicing Chemistry
in the Early Modern Period.”© 2024 The Leiden CollectionSelf-Portrait with Magic Scene
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10. Roeland van Laer, Bentveughels in a Roman Tavern, ca. 1626, oil on canvas, 88.5 x 147.5 cm (Museo diRoma, Rome). For a discussion of this painting, see Thomas Kren, “Chi non vuol Baccho: Roeland vanLaer’s Burlesque Painting about Dutch Artists in Rome,” Simiolus 11 (1980): 63–80; and David A.
Levine, Giulio Briganti, and Ekkehard Mai, eds., I Bamboccianti: Niederländische Malerrebellen im Rom
des Barock (Exh. cat. Cologne, Wallraf-Richartz-Museum; Utrecht, Centraal Museum) (Milan, 1991),
209–11, no. 20.1.
11. Associations between the texts in these two paintings were first made in David A. Levine, Giulio
Briganti, and Ekkehard Mai, eds., I Bamboccianti: Niederländische Malerrebellen im Rom des Barock(Exh. cat. Cologne, Wallraf-Richartz-Museum; Utrecht, Centraal Museum) (Milan, 1991), 199–201, no.
19.7.
12. David Levine, “Pieter van Laer’s Artists’ Tavern: An Ironic Commentary on Art,” in Holländische
Genremalerei im. 17. Jahrhundert: Symposium Berlin 1984, ed. Henning Bock and Thomas W.
Gaehtgens, special issue no. 4, Jahrbuch Preussischer Kulturbesitz (1987): 175–76.
13. A figure or other form in the center of the wall has been rubbed out, perhaps because of some obscene
aspect, as suggested by Holm Bevers, Aus Rembrandts Zeit: Zeichenkunst in Hollands Goldenem
Jahrhundert (Exh. cat. Berlin, Kupferstichkabinet, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin) (Berlin, 2011), 95,
under no. 66.
14. The figure has been identified in the past as either Pan or Chronos, whose attributes include satyr’s legs
or wings, respectively (though neither bears these traits in combination). Many of Guaccius’s woodcut
illustrations are reproduced in Emile Grillot de Givry, Illustrated Anthology of Sorcery, Magic andAlchemy (London, 1991). Compare also the devil with wings, horns, and satyr’s legs in Willem van
Swanenburgh’s engraving of 1609, A Beardless Youth and the Devil at an Easel, which is compared witha similar print, of 1550, by D.V. Coornhert after Maarten van Heemskerck, in Claudia Swan, Art,
Science, and Witchcraft in Early Modern Holland: Jacques de Gheyn II (1565–1629) (Cambridge, 2005),
184–85, fig. 67. The devil and Death (in the form of a skeleton) appear as a pair in numerous sixteenthcentury prints, such as Death and the Devil Come for the Card Player in Hans Holbein the Younger’s
famous series of woodcuts The Dance of Death (1523–26). The group to the right in Van Laer’s drawing
bears some resemblance to Holbein’s ensemble, especially as seen in the reversed version by themonogrammist GS.
15. See Jennifer Montagu, The Expression of the Passions (New Haven and London, 1994), chapter 5, on
this tradition, mainly in Rome; and Dagmar Hirschfelder, Tronie und Porträt in der niederländischen
Malerei des 17. Jahrhunderts (Berlin, 2008), 321–34. On the theoretical background, see Franziska
Gottwald, Das Tronie: Muster, Studie und Meisterwerk (Berlin and Munich, 2011), chapter 2.
16. Interestingly, Van Laer originally included a raised hand in the left background of Self-Portrait with
Magic Scene, as in Boy Bitten by a Lizard, although such excited gestures are common in Italian baroqueart.
17. Irving Lavin, “Bernini’s Bust of the Medusa: An Awful Pun,” in Docere, delectare, movere: Affetti,devozione e retorica nel linguaggio artistico del primo barocco romano. Atti del convegno organizzato© 2024 The Leiden CollectionSelf-Portrait with Magic Scene
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dall’Instituto olandese a Roma e dalla Bibliotheca Hertziana (Max-Planck-Institut) in collaborazione conl’Università cattolica di Nijmegen. Roma, 19–20 gennaio, 1996 (Rome, 1998), 165, fig. 20, relates The
Damned Soul to other expressive heads by Bernini and to the sculptor’s admiration of the ancient
Laocoön.
18. The Leiden Collection is grateful to Bert Schepers, senior editor, Centrum Rubenianum, Antwerp, fordrawing our attention to these paintings. At least three compositions are closely related to Van Laer’s
Self-Portrait: Angelo Caroselli, Negromante, ca. 1620–25, oil on canvas, 60 x 65 cm (formerly in Galerie
Canesso, Lucano and Paris, now in an unknown location); Angelo Caroselli, Negromante, ca. 1625, oilon canvas, 44 x 35 cm (Pinacoteca Civica Francesco Podesti, Ancona) (fig 4); and Pietro Paolini,
Negromante, ca. 1630, oil on canvas, 70 x 92 cm (Collezione Cavallini Sgarbi, Ferrara) (fig 5).
Caroselli revisited the themes of witchcraft and magic throughout his career, and his depictions of thesesubjects were popular among Roman patrons. The 28 August 1687 Roman inventory of Caterina
Chellini’s estate taken upon her death includes a Donna impaurita (a scared woman) by Caroselli (Getty
Provenance Index databases, J. Paul Getty Trust, Archival Inventory I-942 [Chellini], item 262). A
painting by an unidentified artist described as depicting a “negro mante” appears in the Roman inventoryof Cardinal Francesco Barberini’s (1597–1679) wardrobe, compiled between 10 December 1626 and 15
November 1631 (Getty Provenance Index databases, J. Paul Getty Trust, Archival Inventory I-3715[Barberini], item 266); see also Marilyn Aronberg Lavin, Seventeenth-Century Barberini Documents andInventories of Art (New York, 1975), III, inv. 26–31, 74, no. 266. Marta Rossetti has suggested that thisdescription could refer to either Caroselli’s Ancona canvas, or the painting formerly with Galerie
Canesso in Lucano and Paris. Marta Rossetti, “L’Arcano Angelo Caroselli,” in L’Incantesimo di Circe:
Temi di magia nella pittura da Dosso Dossi a Salvator Rosa, ed. Stefania Macioce (Rome, 2004), 118;
Marta Rossetti, Angelo Caroselli 1585–1652: Copista, pasticheur, restauratore, conoscitore (Rome, 2015),
178–82, no. 19; 182–89, no. 20.
19. Caroselli introduced Paolini to themes of witchcraft and alchemy when they worked together in the1620s. Marta Rosetti, “L’Arcano Angelo Caroselli,” in L’Incantesimo di Circe: Temi di magia nella pittura
da Dosso Dossi a Salvator Rosa, ed. Stefania Macioce (Rome, 2004), 117–18, cited in Barbara Savina,“Pietro Paolini, Negromante,” in La Collezione Cavallini Sgarbi Da Niccolò dell’Arca a Gaetano Previati,
ed. Pietro di Natale (Exh. cat. Ferrara, Castello Estense) (Ferrara, 2018), 174, no. 56.
After working in both Rome and Venice, Paolini returned to his native Lucca, where he established an
academy in ca. 1652. His works figure in Lucchese inventories, including those of Mansi and Buonvisi.
See Patrizia Giusta Maccari, “Documenti,” in Pietro Paolini pittore lucchese, 1603–1681 (Lucca, 1987),
191–94.
20. Barbara Savina, “Pietro Paolini, Negromante,” in La Collezione Cavallini Sgarbi Da Niccolò dell’Arca a
Gaetano Previati, ed. Pietro di Natale (Exh. cat. Ferrara, Castello Estense) (Ferrara, 2018), 174, no. 56.
21. For these paintings by Caroselli, see note 18.
22. Vittorio Sgarbi, Il Male: Esercizi di Pittura Crudele, 2 vols. (Exh. cat. Turin, Palazzina Di Caccia Di
Stupinigi) (Milan, 2005), 1: 332, no. 92.
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23. David Fontana, The Secret Language of Symbols: A Visual Key to Symbols and Their Meanings (SanFrancisco, 1994), 62.
24. Marta Rosetti, “L’Arcano Angelo Caroselli,” in L’Incantesimo di Circe: Temi di magia nella pittura da
Dosso Dossi a Salvator Rosa, ed. Stefania Macioce (Rome, 2004), 118; Marta Rossetti, Angelo Caroselli
1585–1652: Copista, pasticheur, restauratore, conoscitore (Rome, 2015), 107–9. In 1597, King James VI(1566–1625) first published his highly influential Daemonologie in three parts, discussing magic,
sorcery, demonology, and witchcraft. This text distinguished the male magician from the female witch.
The magician’s interest in the dark arts stems from a quest for knowledge, whereas the witch’s motives
are vindictive and self-serving. Indeed, depictions of female necromancers warned men against thepowerful wiles of women. Marta Rosetti, “L’Arcano Angelo Caroselli,” in L’Incantesimo di Circe: Temidi magia nella pittura da Dosso Dossi a Salvator Rosa, ed. Stefania Macioce (Rome, 2004), 107–8.
Caroselli’s female subjects would have been viewed as complicit, willing participants, whereas Paolini
and Van Laer’s male subjects would have been considered victims who were not entirely aware ofmagic’s potential outcomes. Vittorio Sgarbi, Il Male: Esercizi di Pittura Crudele, 2 vols. (Exh. cat. Turin,
Palazzina Di Caccia Di Stupinigi) (Milan, 2005), 1: 332, no. 92.
25. Charles Zika, The Appearance of Witchcraft: Print and Visual Culture in Sixteenth-Century Europe(London and New York, 2007), 127.
26. See the case of Giordano Bruno mentioned in note 4 above. Galileo was tried and convicted by theInquisition in Rome in 1633. See also David Freedberg, The Eye of the Lynx: Galileo, His Friends, andthe Beginnings of Modern Natural History (Chicago and London, 2002), esp. 59–62, on “Cassiano’s
drawings and beliefs.”

Provenance
Marquis Cosimo Dragonetti de Torres (1945–2005), Rome [to Richard L. Feigen & Co., 1972][Richard L. Feigen & Co., New York].
From whom acquired by the present owner in 2005.

Exhibition History
Princeton, Princeton University Art Museum, “Dutch and Flemish Paintings from New York Private
Collections,” 12 April–14 June 1987 [lent by Richard L. Feigen].
Cologne, Wallraf-Richartz-Museum, “I Bamboccianti: Niederländische Malerrebellen im Rom desBarock,” 28 August–17 November 1991; Utrecht, Centraal Museum, 6 December 1991–9 February© 2024 The Leiden CollectionSelf-Portrait with Magic Scene
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1992, no. 19.7 [lent by Richard L. Feigen].
Cremona, Santa Maria della Pietà, “Dipingere la musica: Strumenti in posa nell’arte del Cinque e
Seicento,” 12 December 2000–18 March 2001, no. I.33; Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Palais
Harrach, 4 April–1 July 2001, no. I.33 [lent by Richard L. Feigen].
Bartlesville, Oklahoma, The Price Tower Arts Center, “Music’s Power: Great European Paintings on
Musical Themes,” 28 May–July 10, 2002, no. 4 [lent by Richard L. Feigen].
Hartford, Wadsworth Atheneum, on long-term loan, September 2002–December 2003 [lent by Richard
L. Feigen].
London, National Portrait Gallery, “Self-Portrait: Renaissance to Contemporary,” 20 October 2005- 29
January 2006; Sydney Art Gallery of New South Wales, 17 February–14 May 2006, no. 15 [lent by thepresent owner].
Greenwich, Bruce Museum, “Alchemy: Magic, Myth, or Science?” 26 September 2009–3 January 2010
[no number, lent by present owner].
New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art, on loan with the permanent collection, 2006–15 [lent by thepresent owner].
Paris, Petit Palais, “The Baroque Underworld: Vice and Destitution in Rome,” 24 February–24 May
2015 [lent by the present owner].
New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art, on loan with the permanent collection, June 2015–May 2016
[lent by the present owner].
Paris, Museé du Louvre, “Masterpieces of The Leiden Collection: The Age of Rembrandt,” 22
February–22 May 2017 [lent by the present owner].
Beijing, National Museum of China, “Rembrandt and His Time: Masterpieces from The Leiden
Collection,” 17 June–3 September 2017 [lent by the present owner].
Shanghai, Long Museum, West Bund, “Rembrandt, Vermeer and Hals in the Dutch Golden Age:
Masterpieces from The Leiden Collection,” 23 September 2017–25 February 2018 [lent by the present
owner].
Moscow, The Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts, “The Age of Rembrandt and Vermeer: Masterpiecesof The Leiden Collection,” 28 March 2018–22 July 2018 [lent by the present owner].
St. Petersburg, The State Hermitage Museum, “The Age of Rembrandt and Vermeer: Masterpieces of
The Leiden Collection,” 5 September 2018–13 January 2019 [lent by the present owner].
Abu Dhabi, Louvre Abu Dhabi, “Rembrandt, Vermeer and the Dutch Golden Age. Masterpieces fromThe Leiden Collection and the Musée du Louvre,” 14 February–18 May 2019 [lent by the present
owner].
Utrecht, Centraal Museum, “De Bentvueghels,” 11 February–4 June 2023 [lent by the present owner].

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Marini, Maurizio. “Caravaggio e il naturalismo internazionale.” In Storia dell’arte italiana: materiali e
problemi Dal medioevo al Novecento. Edited by Giuio Einaudi, 2:415, no. 380. 12 vols. Turin, 1979–83.
Briganti, Giuliano, et al. I Bamboccianti. Rome, 1983, 59, no. 1.48.
Levine, David, Giuliano Briganti, and Ekkehard Mai. I Bamboccianti: Niederländische Malerrebellen im
Rom des Barock. Exh. cat. Cologne, Wallraf-Richartz-Museum; Utrecht, Centraal Museum. Milan,
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De Meyere, Jos. Straatrumoer: Rome gezien door Nederlandse schilders in de gouden Eeuw Pieter vanlaer en de Bamboccianten. Exh. brochure, Utrecht, Centraal Museum. Utrecht, 1991, no. 19.7.
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Gallery of New South Wales, 2005.
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Technical Summary
The support, a single piece of coarse, plain-weave fabric with tacking margins almost entirely removed, hasbeen lined. The threads are irregular in size and contain numerous slubs. Cusping along all four edges
indicates the original dimensions have been retained. A paper label has been adhered to the stretcher but
there are no wax collection seals, import stamps, stencils or inscriptions along the lining or stretcher reverse.
A dark red-brown preparatory layer has been applied and a narrow band remains exposed along the length ofthe left vertical edge. The paint has been applied quite freely; many details were worked wet into wet withloose, broad brushstrokes. Some details, particularly the highlights in the objects on the table, were added
later with a drier brush. Slight impasto was used to draw attention to the highlights along the skull and thedevil’s hands. Thin glazes of black paint have been applied along the music score.
No underdrawing is readily apparent in infrared images captured at 900–1700 nanometers, though dark paintcan obscure carbon-containing underdrawings.
The painting has not undergone conservation treatment since its acquisition in 2005 and remains in a goodstate of preservation.[1]Technical Summary Endnotes

1. Entry based on a 2012 examination report by Sophie Scully, paintings conservation department intern,
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
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Self-Portrait with Magic Scene
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