Baburen, Dirck van

Baburen, Dirck van (b Wijk bij Duurstede, nr. Utrecht, ?c.1595; d Utrecht, 21 Feb. 1624). Dutch figure painter, mainly of religious scenes. He is first documented in 1611, in Utrecht, where he was a pupil of Moreelse. Soon afterwards he moved to Italy, where he stayed until about 1620, mainly in Rome. During this time his style became strongly influenced by Caravaggio, and his patrons included Cardinal Scipione Borghese and Marchese Vincenzo Giustiniani, both of whom were important collectors of Caravaggio's work. His most prestigious commission in Rome was an altarpiece of the Entombment (?1617) for the church of S. Pietro in Montorio (in situ); more than a dozen copies of the painting are known, dating from the 17th century to the 19th century, showing the high regard it long enjoyed; in his Cicerone (1855), Jacob Burckhardt compared it favourably with Caravaggio's famous painting of the subject (1602–4, Pinacoteca, Vatican), on which it is clearly based. Baburen returned to the Netherlands in about 1620 and although he died only a few years after this, he played a leading role, with Honthorst and Terbrugghen, in establishing Utrecht as a stronghold of the Caravaggesque style (see Utrecht Caravaggisti). His best-known work is The Procuress (1622, MFA, Boston). This picture is seen in the background of two paintings by Vermeer, whose mother-in-law evidently owned it.