Page:Hofstede de Groot catalogue raisonné, Volume 3, 1910.djvu/156

 i 4 2 ADRIAEN VAN OSTADE SECT. many pictures are described as the results of their collaboration (see, for instance, Nos. 74^, 1230, 148^, r, d^ *, and so on). While Dusart was a pupil of Ostade's in his later period, a certain A. VICTORIJN or VICTORINUS took as his models the pictures of the early period. We know nothing of his life not even whether he was a Dutchman. The few signed pictures of his, that have been seen by the writer, are in the royal palaces of Denmark. In these, Victorinus imitates the compositions of Ostade's early years, especially the series representing the five senses (see Nos. 6-27). A somewhat elaborate composition by him, of a village school, was offered for sale to the Mauritshuis, The Hague, a few years ago. Herr Kurt Freise, who has assisted with this volume, is publishing an article on Victorinus. Although JAN MIENSE MOLENAER can scarcely be regarded as one of Ostade's pupils, for he was a fellow-student of Ostade's under Frans Hals, his pictures are very often ascribed to his more famous and more prosperous contemporary. He himself had a less talented and unimportant brother, BARTHOLOMEUS MOLENAER, who was at work about 1640 ; this man owed far more to Ostade than to his own brother, and, like Victorinus, showed a preference for Ostade's early pictures. Of higher artistic importance than the two men just named is CORNELIS BEGA (1620-64). He developed his art independently and thus shows fewer traces of Ostade's influence in his pictures, despite the similarity of their themes ; his etchings, however, bear an unmistakable resemblance to Ostade's. The statement repeated in all the authorities, that Richard Brakenburg (1650-1702) was a pupil of Ostade's, is probably based on a hasty reading of a passage in Houbraken (iii. 383), who merely says that Brakenburg painted rustic groups in the manner of Ostade. On the other hand, it is certain from his own memoranda that MICHIEL VAN MUSSCHER (1645-1705) worked for three months of the year 1667 in Ostade's studio. It cannot be said that the influence of his last teacher left permanent traces in Van Musscher's work. At about the same time, one of the least known of his pupils must have been working in Ostade's studio, namely, JOHANNES DE GROOT, whose only signed pictures, now in the Coblenz Museum, are dated 1670. He is said to have been born in 1650 and lived till 1726. In his later life he was a coffee-merchant and also a picture-dealer ; this fact explains not to the disadvantage of art the rarity of his pictures. Imitators of Ostade who must not go unmentioned here are those numerous but unnamed artists who, with the help of Ostade's etchings and drawings, produced pictures in his manner which sometimes even in the great collections pass for the master's own works. Reference may be made, for instance, to the note on a picture in the Rijksmuseum under No. 3110.