Commemorating 4 centuries since the death of Jan Brueghel the Elder 1

Four centuries ago tomorrow, on 13 January 1625, one of art’s great innovators and collaborators died in the city of Antwerp, where he had painted for much of his career. He is Jan Brueghel the Elder. Almost everyone in his family was an artist, even his maternal grandmother. Just for the record, here’s a list of some of his closest relatives:

father, Pieter Bruegel the Elder,
brother, Pieter Brueghel the Younger,
maternal grandfather, Pieter Coecke van Aelst,
maternal grandmother, Mayken Verhulst (Marie Bessemers),
son, Jan Brueghel the Younger.

Some of the family appear to have preferred their surname spelled Brueghel, others as Bruegel, and you’ll also come across Breughel.

Jan the Elder was born in 1568 in Brussels when it was part of the Habsburg Netherlands, encompassing both the modern Netherlands and Belgium. He was orphaned as a young child, so, together with his older brother Pieter the Younger and their sister went to live with his widowed maternal grandmother, Mayken Verhulst, who became his first teacher. The two boys were then sent to Antwerp to pursue their studies, and on to Italy via Cologne to paint from the masters there.

From 1592 to 1596 he was based in Rome and Milan, where he made friends with Paul Bril, an Antwerp landscape painter who was living in Rome where he helped to found local landscape painting, and Hans Rottenhammer, with whom Jan the Elder was to collaborate. Brueghel also found himself a patron, for whom he painted many of his early landscapes and floral still lifes.

Jan Brueghel the Elder (1568–1625), Orpheus in the Underworld (1594), oil on copper, 27 x 36 cm, Palazzo Pitti, Florence, Italy. Wikimedia Commons.

In 1594, Jan the Elder painted his wonderful account of Orpheus in the Underworld, featuring Orpheus walking and holding his lyre, to the left of centre. He is approaching Hades and Persephone, who sit at the far left as king and queen of the Underworld.

Jan the Elder returned to settle in Antwerp and build his workshop there. A year later he was admitted as a Master to the Guild of Saint Luke, and was soon elected its Dean.

Jan Brueghel the Elder (1568–1625), Juno in the Underworld (1596-98), oil on copper, 25.5 x 35.5 cm, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, Dresden, Germany. Wikimedia Commons.

He returned to the nether regions between 1596-98 with his outstanding account of Juno in the Underworld. This vision of Hades rivals even Hieronymus Bosch’s apocalyptic scenes, and comes perilously close to losing Juno altogether in its sea of horror and suffering, as seen in the detail below.

Jan Brueghel the Elder (1568–1625), Juno in the Underworld (detail) (1596-98), oil on copper, 25.5 x 35.5 cm, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, Dresden, Germany. Wikimedia Commons.

Juno’s cool blue robes and a couple of peacocks stand out from the reds and browns, the monsters and the tormented. She waves at the trio of Furies, with their snake-filled hair and screaming faces. A few years later, Wouters painted another version which could only have been based on this.

Jan Brueghel the Elder (1568–1625) and Hans Rottenhammer (1564–1625), Christ’s Descent into Limbo (1597), oil on copper, 26.5 x 35.5 cm, Koninklijk Kabinet van Schilderijen Mauritshuis, The Hague, The Netherlands. Wikimedia Commons.

In 1597, he collaborated with his friend Hans Rottenhammer in this relatively unusual vision of Christ’s Descent into Limbo, the phase between the Crucifixion and Resurrection.

Jan Brueghel the Elder (1568–1625), The Battle of Issus (1602), oil on canvas, 86.5 x 135.5 cm, Musée du Louvre, Paris. Image by Jean-Pol GRANDMONT, via Wikimedia Commons.

His conventional view of The Battle of Issus from 1602 is a fine account of this great battle, placing Alexander on his black horse Bucephalus in the centre of its foreground.

In 1604, Jan the Elder visited the court of Rudolf II, Holy Roman Emperor at the time, in Prague. Then in 1606, he was appointed court painter to the sovereigns of the Spanish Netherlands. His duties involved attending court in Brussels for periods, and of course painting.

Jan Brueghel the Elder (1568–1625) and Hendrick de Clerck (1560/1570–1630), Abundance and the Four Elements (c 1606), oil on copper, 51 x 64 cm, Museo Nacional del Prado, Madrid, Spain. Wikimedia Commons.

In about 1606, he joined Hendrick de Clerck to paint Abundance and the Four Elements, one of the few depictions to roll the traditional series of four elements into a single composition. At the lower right and centre is earth with a cornucopia, the upper left is air and fire, and lower left is water.

Jan Brueghel the Elder (1568–1625), Latona and the Lycian Peasants (1595-1610), oil on panel, 37 × 56 cm, Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Wikimedia Commons.

At some time between 1595 and 1610, Jan the Elder painted one of the finest landscape settings for Ovid’s myth of Latona and the Lycian Peasants. Set in a dense forest, probably quite inappropriate for Lycia, the locals are busy cutting reeds and foraging. Latona, at the bottom left, is seen remonstrating with a peasant, over to the right.

As the detail below shows, the goddess is in need, as are her babies. The peasant closest to her, brandishing his fist, is already rapidly turning into a frog. There are many other frogs around, including a pair at the bottom left corner, near the feet of one of the babies.

Jan Brueghel the Elder (1568–1625), Latona and the Lycian Peasants (detail) (1595-1610), oil on panel, 37 × 56 cm, Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Wikimedia Commons.

Jan the Elder’s greatest and most enduring collaborations were with Peter Paul Rubens, the other leading Flemish painter of the day whose skill with figures was unmatched. From 1610, Rubens acted as Brueghel’s agent, negotiating with Cardinal Borromeo, Brueghel’s patron.

Peter Paul Rubens (1577–1640) and Jan Brueghel the Elder (1568–1625), The Return from War: Mars Disarmed by Venus (c 1610), oil on panel, 127.3 x 163.5 cm, J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, CA. Wikimedia Commons.

Rubens and Jan the Elder painted The Return from War: Mars Disarmed by Venus in about 1610, early in Rubens’ career. Beyond its mythical allegory is a little surprise: in the foreground, amid the weapons, is a pair of guinea pigs feeding quietly. Guinea pigs had been introduced across Europe, including the Netherlands and Low Countries where they came into vogue by about 1600, and became favourites of Jan the Elder and his son Jan the Younger, whose godfather was Rubens.

Jan Brueghel the Elder (1568–1625), The Temptation of Saint Anthony (c 1610), oil on canvas, 148 x 230 cm, Museo Nacional de San Gregorio, Valladolid, Spain. Wikimedia Commons.

At about the same time, Jan the Elder returned to Hell, this time on earth in The Temptation of Saint Anthony (c 1610). This combines a cavalcade of traditional figures with a foreground of more bizarre ones derived from Hieronymus Bosch of a century earlier. Those include an old person’s head with four human legs, and a bird with two heads, one of a cockerel and the other a duck with a clarinet-like bill. A second image of the saint appears in the sky, surrounded by daemons, and a church is on fire in the background.

Jan Brueghel the Elder (1568–1625), Garland of Flowers around an Allegory of Farming (1615), oil on panel, 106.3 x 69.9 cm, Koninklijk Kabinet van Schilderijen Mauritshuis, The Hague, The Netherlands. Wikimedia Commons.

That’s a great contrast from his exquisite decorative image of a Garland of Flowers around an Allegory of Farming from 1615, placing the goddess Cybele in its central cameo.

Tomorrow I’ll trace Jan the Elder’s collaborations with Rubens to their culmination in one of the finest series of paintings in the European canon, their allegories of the five senses.