Lot 23: Tulips, daffodils, irises and roses in a glass vase with butterflies and other insects on a ledge

Jan Philips van Thielen (Mechelen 1618-1667 Boisschot)
Tulips, daffodils, irises and roses in a glass vase with butterflies and other insects on a ledge
signed 'P Van Thielen F' (lower right)
oil on panel
17¼ x 12½ in. (43.8 x 31.9 cm)

Paris art market, where purchased in 1971 by a private collector (below).
Anonymous sale [Property of a Private Collector]; Sotheby's, New York, 3 June 1988, lot 142 (sold $110,000), and acquired shortly after by the present owner.

Property from a European Private Collection (lots 23 and 27)


Jan Philips van Thielen specialised in still lifes and was an apprentice of the flower painter, Daniel Seghers, with whom he is sometimes confused. His signed paintings help to establish a clear chronology for his oeuvre - those signed 'I. P. Van Thielen Rigouldts' (after his mother) date from the 1640s; others signed 'I.P. Van Thielen' painted after 1650; while the signature 'I.P. Van Thielen Heere Van Cowenberch' is found on his late works of the 1660s, when he assumed the title of Lord Cowenberch. The present example dates from the 1650s, a dating confirmed by Fred Meijer of the RKD, to whom we are grateful. It is characteristically crisp example, in which the different colours and shapes the flowers are counterbalanced by the beautiful simplicity of the glass vase and monochromatic background.