Daniel Seghers (1590-1661)

Daniel Seghers (1590–1661), Bouquet of Flowers in a Glass Vase

Daniel Seghers was a student of Jan Brueghel, became a master in Antwerp in 1611 and joined the Jesuit order in 1614. From 1625 to 1627 he was in Rome with the Jesuits. For him, flowers embodied the beauty of divine creation. He painted bouquets of flowers in vases as well as flower garlands and wreaths around painted stone cartridges in which colleagues painted figurative scenes and saints. In a glass vase are tulips, roses, white and blue lilies and other flowers, the leaves and stems of which draw arabesques against the dark background. While the bouquets of his teacher Jan Brueghel combine an unrealistic number of flowers in one bouquet, Seghers paints relatively few flowers in one bouquet and attaches great importance to emphasizing the shapes of each flower in an artful, elegant arrangement. The majority of the flowers form a dense bouquet directly above the opening of the vase, some magnificent tulips and lilies protrude and create striking accents in the composition.
According to Klaus Ertz, the picture was painted in Antwerp in the early 1640s.
Oil on canvas, 67,5 × 56 cm