Lot 2009 Nα

The Antwerp-born painter Theodor Rombouts travelled to Italy in September 1515 and spent the following seven years in Rome. Although Caravaggio had already died, the formative force of his personality lived on among the Roman painters, and it had also a direct impact on the young Fleming. Rombout's works from this period are characterised by the powerful chiaroscuro of the Roman Caravaggists.
It was only after his return to Antwerp in 1625 that his colour palette began to brighten under the influence of his great contemporary, Peter Paul Rubens. The painting ‘Two Flute Players at a Brazier’ (Huys Janssen calls it ‘Young Gentry’), dated 1637, is one of the painter's last works, as he died in the same year.
The scene in this composition is brightly painted in pink, yellow and blue colours with controlled, restrained brushstrokes. The mood is calm and serene. The close juxtaposition of the three young men in half-length figures is certainly reminiscent of Caravaggio's compositions, but not their typology. By the 1630s, Rombouts had clearly become an independent classical painter in his own right.

According to an alternative opinion, this painting is a work by Jacques des Rousseaux (c. 1600 Tourcoing - 1638 Leiden).