Again, the dominant figure is an old man, here posed for by a different model, ostensibly playing a cello in a room littered with objects and seen from above, so that the space tips up to a horizon well above the picture top.
The progressive tipping and enclosure of space can be observed in the sequence of works leading up to this one, a strategy that tends to equalize the parts of the picture and enhance their pictorial interaction.
[9] A different reading, one that supports Driscoll's basic conclusion but identifies Burgess as Beethoven, turns on the question of why Dickinson chose to depict the second violin part to represent the quartet, given the fact that without the melody of the first violin something essential is missing.
The choice confirms his intention to express his indebtedness to his brother by suggesting that he played second fiddle to Burgess's Beethoven.
[11] He believes that by this time Dickinson was probably familiar with Proust's description of taste and smell awakening recollections of the past.
Further, in the three large studio paintings following The Cello Player (The Fossil Hunters, Woodland Scene, and Composition with Still Life) the world that Dickinson creates has become so difficult to reconcile with waking experience that the paintings demand to be seen as dreams or visions.