Oil Painting, 'Musicians: An Old Man and an Old Woman', after Lucas van Leyden, North Netherlands

On the left, a man sitting on the ground is tuning a guitar while an old woman is playing a violin at right.

Bequeathed by John M. Parsons

Bequeathed by John M. Parsons, 1870.
John Meeson Parsons (1798-1870), art collector, was born in Newport, Shropshire. He later settled in London, and became a member of the stock exchange. His interest in railways led to his election as an associate of the Institution of Civil Engineers in 1839, and he was director or chairman of two railway companies between 1843 and 1848. Much of his time however was spent collecting pictures and works of art. In his will he offered his collection of mostly German and Dutch schools to the National Gallery (which selected only three works) and to the Department of Science and Art at South Kensington, later the Victoria and Albert Museum. The South Kensington Museum acquired ninety-two oil paintings and forty-seven watercolours. A number of engravings were also left to the British Museum.

Historical significance: Lucas van Leyden was a remarkably versatile and prolific printmaker, draughtsman and painter although a great number of his paintings are now lost and consist hitherto in only seventeen extant originals. Lucas van Leyden's prolific output of prints (around 200) includes a large number of biblical scenes and few profane subjects more difficult to interpret. This exact copy of an engraving dated 1524 is one of them and its meaning is still uncertain. It may belong to the 'World Upside Down' imaginary as music is usually associated with youth and beauty but it may also refer to something else. For instance, the Woman picking fleas from a dog, dated 1511 is presumably intended as a personification of sloth while the Milkmaid, 1510, long interpreted as a simple scene of everyday life may contain erotic allusions. Such subject matter along with amorous couples, soldiers or beggars are grounded in the older German tradition of printmaking and may have reached Lucas through the influence of Albrecht Dürer, whom he met in Antwerp. The present picture however conveys a mood of sadness and stillness that may be associated with old age while the ostensible clog and purse must enclose a precise meaning, maybe sloppiness and cupidity.

Genre painting involving low class society, especially peasants but also as the decades progressed and the demand for such pictures evolved more elevated class exponents, became more and more popular throughout the 17th century in the Netherlands. These pictures usually depict scenes of everyday life set in domestic interiors or in the countryside but also include comic imaginary, already largely present on the margins of medieval art, assuming in the arts a more central position during the sixteenth century. Prints in particular, with their largely anonymous audience, allowed this type of images to develop. Through a common process, the 'World Upside Down', these representations rely on the inversion of preferred societal structures and behaviours for their comic effect. Lucas van Leyden and the Amsterdam printmaker Cornelis Anthonisz. produced a number of these images. However not all of these pictures are easy to interpret and for a great number of them, scholars are still debating whether they bear a metaphorical meaning and hidden messages, or just feature a close depiction of contemporary events.

Lucas van Leyden (ca. 1494-1533) was a remarkably versatile and prolific printmaker, draughtsman and painter. He trained in Leyden with his father, Hugo Jacobsz , and Cornelis Engebrechtsz. (ca. 1465-1527). He was also largely influenced by Albrecht Dürer, whom he met in Antwerp in 1521. Lucas van Leyden had a strong influence on his contemporaries and his work was largely copied but his manner of painting was never directly imitated.

This painting is an exact copy of a print by Lucas van Leyden, dated 1524. It belongs to a small group of profanes subjects among a much larger number of biblical scenes. These profane representations are often to be intended as comic pictures that enclose hidden meanings. The comic here may result from an inversion of traditional associations: music is usually associated with youth and beauty, and therefore love, concepts that contrast with elderly people. The whole picture conveys a mood of sadness and stillness that may be associated with old age while the ostensible clog and purse must enclose a precise meaning, maybe sloppiness and cupidity, respectively referring to traditional defects of old men and old women.

532-1870