Master of the Female Half-Lengths

Three young women make music together, with a lute, a flute and an open book of music. The little panel belongs to the Harrach family collection in Austria, and the notes on the page are painted clearly enough to be read. They give a chanson, Jouissance vous donneray, by Claudin de Sermisy, a musician of the French royal chapel, on a poem by Clément Marot, court poet to King Francis I.

Pictures like that one, of elegant young women at half length, reading, writing or playing music, gave this painter a name, and the name probably covers more than one person. Most scholars now see a workshop active from about 1525 to 1550, very likely in Antwerp, since its landscapes come close to those of Joachim Patinir, the Antwerp specialist in wide panoramic scenery. Bruges, Ghent and Mechelen have also been proposed, and the art historian Otto Benesch suggested a Bruges painter, Hans Vereycke, without winning general agreement.

Some of the women hold a small jar of ointment, the attribute of Mary Magdalene, so the same elegant figure could pass as a saint or as a lady of fashion.