Violin Player
Pieter Cornelisz. van Slingeland
mid-17th century
Medium
Black chalk, ruled in pen and brown ink, on ivory laid paper
Dimensions
11.3 × 10.1 cm (4 1/2 × 4 in.)
Classification
drawings (visual works)
Department
Prints and Drawings
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
243886
Rights
Public Domain
About this artwork
This sensitive and evocative drawing relates closely to a painting of the same subject. The artist lightly applied black chalk to capture the facial features and hair of his sitter. Compared to the passage’s precision, the rest of the composition adopts a relatively abstract style. For example, the violin is only schematically described in outlines, and the viewer is left to imagine the bow that the figure should be holding in his right hand.