Brueghel, Jan the Elder (1568-1625)
Large bouquet of flowers in a wooden vessel
c.1606–1607
Oil on oak, 97.5 × 73 cm
Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna
From 1600 on, painting flowers developed into a separate category of still life. Jan Brueghel is one of the main representatives of this genre, with sixteen paintings of this kind attributed to him. The “Flowers in a Wooden Vessel” – one of the most famous depictions of flowers ever created – is not a reflection of a real bouquet, resembling instead an encyclopaedic panorama of rare species. Art and scientific curiosity are combined in this highly meticulous, virtuosic reproduction of 130 different flowers. (KHM)