Csornay Boldizsár - Dobos Zsuzsa - Varga Ágota - Zakariás János szerk.: A Szépművészeti Múzeum közleményei 98. (Budapest, 2003)

TÁTRAI, JÚLIA: 'Jacob de Backer invenit' - The Allegory of Smell. A New Aquisition of the Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest

In Van Mander 's 1604 collection of biographies he recalls Backer as a talented painter who had just recently died young.

13 According to Van Mander, Backer, born in Antwerp, had lived with the painter and art dealer Anthonis van Palermo, an extraordinarily demanding master who frequently sold Backer's works in France. Later Backer moved to the home of Hendrick van Steenwijck, where he continued his work with great enthusiasm. Van Mander felt that his early death at thirty, in the arms of Palermo's daughter, was caused by his constantly bent posture when working and his lack of physical activity. Van Mander hailed him as one of the greatest colourists in Antwerp, noting that his works "are very sought after and wanted everywhere, and enrich the cabinets or galleries of art lovers in many places".

14 Although Grève thought that Backer was among those artists with whom the young Van Mander was personally acquainted,

15 Müller Hofstede considered Van Mander 's sources to be misleading; in part because Backer's name does not appear in the register of the Painter's Guild of Antwerp, either as the pupil of Anthonis Palermo

16 or the elder Hendrick Steenwijck.

17 Moreover, Backer's supposed second master was a painter of architecture; yet there is no evidence of such influence in Backer's works.

18 In distinguishing the works of Backer from those of his Flemish contemporaries and assembling his oeuvre, Müller Hofstede relied on the stylistic characteristics of two dated paintings and two documented in the eighteenth century. Müller Hofstede described Backer as a unique voice in the pre-Rubens period of painting in Antwerp, whose formal language was closely tied to that of the later mannerism of Florence and Rome. This manifests itself primarily in the gestures recalling Vasari and Jacopo Zucchi and the marble-like painting of the naked bodies. Although the works that can be attributed to Backer with absolute certainty are few in number, ever since Müller Hofstede

's study, an increasing number of paintings assigned to the Antwerp master have cropped up in art historical literature and in the art trade. E. Leuscher, however, noted that, while similar in theme and Italianizing style, the works ascribed to Backer are of uneven quality. Leuschner thus suggested introducing a new term 'the De Backer group' to explain the discrepancies between works which otherwise 13 Lacking other biographical information on Backer, researchers have tried to determine his date of birth and death based on Van Mander's biography and signed or documented works by the master. MüllerHofstede's theory (Jacques de Backer, especially pp. 229-230, [n. 12] ) has been most widely accepted (birth: ca. 1540 - death: a little before 1600), but other suggestions have been put forward in professional art history literature: Cf. Leuschner, E., Defining De Backer. New Evidence on the Last Phase of Antwerp Mannerism before Rubens, Gazette des Beaux-Arts 87 (2001) 167-192, n. 3. 14 'Sijn dinghen worden over al seer gesocht en begecrt / en verciere in veel plaetsen der liefhebbers cabinets oft cameren.' (231v46 and 232r01). Van Mander, Karel, Het Schilder-Boeck, Haarlem 1604, the part on Backer: 231 v 16 - 232r09. For a critical edition on the works of Karel van Mander, see: Miedema, H., The Lives of the Illustrious Netherlandish and German Painters from the first edition of the Schilderboeck (1603-1604) with an Introduction and Translation I-IV, Doornspijk 1994-1997. 15 Grève, H.E., De Bronnen van Carel van Mander voor 'Het Leven der Doorluchtighe Nederlandtsche en Hoogduytsche Schilders'

, 'S-Gravenhage 1903, p. 9. 16 Anthonis van Palermo (1503- or 1523 - ca. 1589), from 1545 a master in Antwerp. His works are unknown. 17 The elder Hendrick van Steenwijck (ca. 1550-1603), from 1577 a master in Antwerp. 18 Müller Hofstede, Jacques de Backer (n. 12) p. 229.