Provenance:
• private collection, South Germany;
• private collection.
In 1608, at the height of his success, Abraham Janssens painted a work of great quality that was to make him famous throughout...
read moreProvenance:
• private collection, South Germany;
• private collection.
In 1608, at the height of his success, Abraham Janssens painted a work of great quality that was to make him famous throughout the Netherlands: ‘The Four Elements’. This vast painting (166 x 200 cm) was put on public exhibition the year it was painted and was hugely successful. ‘The Four Elements’ made Janssens the most popular artist in Antwerp. Sold at auction in 1936, the work has now disappeared.
As a result of this success, the artist painted the same composition in a smaller format (50.4 x 64.4 cm). Ordered by a collector from Antwerp for his private cabinet, our version is dated 1616/1617. Owing to the high level of quality and its perfect resemblance with the work of 1608, it can be attributed to Abraham Janssens without a doubt.
The cleverly organised scenes and the elaborate arrangement of the figures, characteristic of his earlier works, brings the spirit of this painting closer to the style of Rubens. He gives his powerfully shaped figures undetermined attitudes and expressions. Identifiable by its horn of abundance, the Earth is represented by a richly clothed old woman whose head is decorated with a ‘refined wreath’. Water is illustrated as a naked young woman wearing a crown of reeds. She is sitting on a rock and moving her sceptre to make water run that will bring to life the fish scattered at her feet. The peacock – the attribute of Juno, queen of heaven – along with the rainbow and the wings of the second naked woman, allow us to identify this scene as the personification of Air. As for Fire, he turns his back on us. Sitting on a canon that is spewing flames, this young man who resembles the god Mars, is wearing a helmet decorated with the fire salamander.
We can clearly see Abraham Janssens’ taste for antiquity in this painting. The painter remained strongly influenced by his Venetian, Florentine and Roman contemporaries. Spurred on by the strong impetus of Italian art in terms of plasticity and expressiveness, he favoured contours to give his figures a voluminous and sculptural character. He splendidly demonstrates his artistic ability and aptitude at creating beautiful female nudes with gentle, classical faces, thus respecting the canons of beauty of classical Italy. A master of chiaroscuro, he liked his paintings to be composed of strong contrasts of light and shade. He uses it here with precision for a most spectacular rendering.
Appreciated by his contemporaries, the paintings of Abraham Janssens still figure among the best collections today. This fabulous portrayal of the Four Elements is undoubtedly one of the most accomplished and most important in the artist’s career.
1575– Antwerp – 1632
Abraham Janssens, a painter of historical, allegorical, mythological and religious subjects, was born in Antwerp in 1575. He first trained with the painter Jan Snellinck. After...
read more1575– Antwerp – 1632
Abraham Janssens, a painter of historical, allegorical, mythological and religious subjects, was born in Antwerp in 1575. He first trained with the painter Jan Snellinck. After studying in Rome for three years, where the Caraveggesque movement was in full bloom, he returned to Antwerp in 1601 and was immediately accepted into the Guild of Saint Luke as a master. Thanks to his experience in Italy, he quickly became a leader of the Antwerp school, alongside Ambrosius Francken and Otto van Veen, heading the tradition of monumental painting as opposed to the development of small-sized genre painting.
Significant numbers of orders testify to the prestige he enjoyed. In 1605, he was asked to paint the triptych of the metropolitan chapel of the corporation of painters in Saint Rombaut’s church in Malines. In 1609, it was Antwerp’s turn to order an allegorical painting from him, celebrating the essential role of the Scheldt in Antwerp’s prosperity: this painting, ‘Scaldis et Antverpia’, still hangs in the Museum of Fine Arts in Antwerp. In this initial period of maturity, Janssens’ paintings are characterised by the highly plastic appearance of his figures; they are all linked to each other in compositions painted in close-up, and emphasised by a very personal distribution of shadows and light.
Janssens dominant position in the Antwerp scene rapidly changed with the return of Peter Paul Rubens from Italy in 1608. Gradually removed from the limelight by his rival, Abraham Janssens succeeded in developing his style by following the new trends and adopting a more ‘baroque’ style. However, he always retained this vigorous and appealing touch which can be seen in all his works.
