Frans van Everbroeck, who had been a pupil in Antwerp of Joris van Son (1623 – 1667), specialised in fruit and in flower still lifes: deceptive representations of garlands round a central cartouche or individual swags. At the end of his career van Everbroeck left his hometown Antwerp for London.

 

Collaboration between two specialists is a typical feature of early Antwerp Baroque painting. It is not known who painted the figures of Joseph and Jesus in the contemporary centre in-set image.

 

 

Flemish painter

Probably Antwerp, circa 1638 – 1676/1693, London or Antwerp?

 

Painter of fruit and of Vanitas still lifes.

 

The father of van Everbroeck must also have been a painter, as our painter was inscribed as apprentice in the Antwerp Painter’s Guild as ‘wijnmeester’, meaning he was the son of a Master of this guild. Frans studied under the prominent still life painter Joris van Son (Antwerp 1623 – 1667 Antwerp). He became Master in the year 1661/1662.

 

Van Everbroeck was active in Antwerp, but in 1667 he worked for a short time in Amsterdam. In September 1673 he was last mentioned in Antwerp. In 1676 he was admitted to the Painter’s Guild in London. In the period 1689 to 1693, paintings by van Everbroeck were regularly offered at English auctions, so possibly at that time he was still active in London.

 

Further information on his life is sketchy.

 

 

Van Everbroeck painted a fair number of these stone cartouches decorated with fruit garlands: our devotional image sits in a theatrical trompe l’oeil stone setting with a pronouced depth that has been decorated with rich fruit wreaths.

 

The pomegrenate is a symbol of resurrection and of life everlasting.

The two butterflies enhence the Vanitas message of this composition: they are lively, but fragile and ephemere creatures, standing for the metamorphosis of the soul once it has left a dead body.

 

It is not known whom van Everbroeck collaborated with for the figures inside his cartouches. 

Saint Joseph carries a blooming staff which refers to him being chosen as the husband of Mary according to the Golden Legend, a medieval collection of legendary lives and accounts of miracles of important Christian saints compiled around 1260 by Jacobus de Voragine, the archbishop of Genoa. When Mary was on the verge of womanhood all unmarried men of the House of King David were called to the Temple in Jerusalem, where they had to lay a branch on the altar. Joseph’s stick immediately bloomed and a dove landed on it, thus revealing God’s choice.

Joseph leads little Jesus Christ, who is carrying the Globus Cruciger (the orb and the cross) that symbolises His dominion over the world.

 

 

Because it is a good, typical trompe l’oeil still life by van Everbroeck, painted round a nice devotional composition at the middle, painted by a yet unidentified hand.