Flemish painter.

 

Active in Antwerp:

- de Bridt joined the local Painter’s Guild in the year 1688/1689.

- He was last recorded in the Painter’s Guild in the year 1721/1722.

- Our painter was also active as a brewer.  In 1717 he was elected as the dean of the Antwerp nation of brewers, the organisation representing the interests of the brewers in Antwerp.

 

Painter of game still lifes.

 

He was clearly influenced by an earlier fellow townsman, Jan Fyt (Antwerp 1611 – 1661 Antwerp). Fyt was a highly important and prolific painter of game pieces. He also painted flower and fruit still lifes and scenes with live animals.

Fyt is known for his technical mastery and bold facility in the representation of animals, of their furs and especially of the plumes 

of birds. 

Fyt had several pupils. He seems to have passed away too early for de Bridt to have studied under him. Fyt’s best-known pupils are

- Peeter Boel (Antwerp 1622 – 1674 Paris) who worked in Genoa (1647 – 1649, Antwerp (1650 – 1668) and Paris (1669 – 1674).

- Jacques van de Kerckhove (Antwerp 1636/37 – 1712 Venice) who worked in Antwerp (1649 – 1657) and above all in Venice (1685 – 1712).

 

De Bridt's paintings are not rare: a fair number of them is signed, as is ours. Others must go hidden under erroneous attributions to Jan Fyt.

A fair number of museums hold paintings by our painter: from Bergen and Oslo in Norway, to Dessau in Germany  and Cambrai, Menton and Périgeux in France. Museum M in Louvain holds a sumptuous still life with grapes, dead birds, a sliver plate and a lobster.

 

Our game still life clearly shows the influence of Jan Fyt: the still life is set against the background of a landscape with a vibrant light shining through the clouds.

 

 

Because our hunting trophy is displayed with a lot of sense for illusionistic realism.