(Hamburg 1658-Rome 1722) A table covered with a fringed white tablecloth and laid with a plate of sausage, bacon, bread, and cheese, a wine jug, and a knife, oil on canvas, 50 x 67 cm, framed

Provenance: Italian private collection. The present painting is a variation of the artist’s work in the Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Antica in the Palazzo Corsini in Rome (comp. La Natura Morta in Italia, vol. II, Milan 1989, p. 822, fig. 975). Both paintings show the motifs of the plate of sausage and bacon and the knife in the same position. The plain pinewood table and the fringed tablecloth are identical as well. Unlike our painting, the picture in the Corsini Collection is monogrammed and dated 1717. Giuliano Briganti, who published the latter work in 1954, claims that Berentz’s work is dependent on the art of Cristoforo Munari, although it would seem more plausible to say that Munari, who was Berentz’s junior, was influenced by his older colleague. Berentz came from Hamburg and arrived in Rome in the latter half of the 1680s, settling there permanently. He lived in the house of the Marchese Pallavicini, who became his first patron in Rome. Thanks to his talent for decorative compositions, he soon became a popular artist. In 1696 Berentz created his masterwork in a joint effort with Carlo Maratta: a still life of flowers and fruit with a woman picking grapes (Museo di Capodimonte, Naples, the former Marchese Pallavicini Collection). Berentz played an important role in the development of Roman still life painting, introducing the local artists to motifs from Northern Europe.