(Antwerp 1601–1678)
A cartouche decorated with flowers and depicting Saint Martin cutting his cloak in half
signed at lower right: J. Breughel,
oil on copper, 85 x 61.5 cm, framed

We are grateful to Dr. Klaus Ertz for confirming the authenticity of the present painting, which is accompanied by a certificate (January 2014).

Dr. Ertz has noted that Jan Brueghel painted the present work in the 1640s. In this painting, Brueghel went far beyond the traditional boundaries of the genre of a saint’s picture surrounded by a floral wreath. This type of picture had been introduced in Antwerp in the early 17th century and greatly accommodated the collaboration of two or more artists in one painting, as was typical of the for this school of painting. For comparable works, Brueghel had painted a wreath of flowers and left an area for a medallion, which one of his painter colleagues subsequently filled with a religious picture. For the present painting, which plays with trompe-l’oeil, his plan was different. The aedicula enclosing the saint occupies the centre of the picture. Brueghel and his figure painter managed to animate the statuary impression of this traditional type of stone cartouche by introducing subsidiary figures. On the steps leading towards the lower edge lie a beggar and a child to whom the saint gives parts of his cloak. The present collaborative work is not the usual ‘picture within a picture’ of a medallion framed by a wreath of flowers. The rare iconography, the quality of the composition and painterly treatment, Brueghel’s rare signature, and the costly copper support suggest an important commission. According to Dr. Ertz, the figure painter must be an as yet unidentified follower of Rubens.