Younger son of the famous Pieter Bruegel, Jan did not inherit the right to copy his father’s pictures as his elder brother Peter the Younger did. Instead he had to invent a different realm of subject matter for himself, and he turned what was doubtless his short-sightedness to good use, painting pictures of exquisite detail and entrancing miniature scale. His landscapes are microcosms of the known flora and fauna of his day, and we can feel his delight in discovering new species of tulip, say, or of parrot. The beautiful scenes he painted are analysed in this lecture, but above all, they are presented for the sheer enjoyment of the audience.
Chantal Brotherton-Ratcliffe has an MA from Edinburgh, and PhD from the Warburg Institute, London. She trained briefly as a paintings conservator, and has lectured on fifteenth, sixteenth and seventeenth century European painting for over 30 years at Sotheby’s Institute of Art, as well as for a number of institutions in London including the National Gallery, the Wallace Collection and the RA.