Late 17th century, Flemish School, Banquet of nobles

Late 17th century, Flemish School Banquet of nobles Oil on canvas, 48 x 63 cm With frame, 68 x 86 cm In this beautiful painting, a festive company of gentlemen and noblewomen converses while drinking wine and enjoying seasonal fruits in a pleasant and Arcadian natural landscape. The bright colors and the meticulousness and skill in rendering details are reminiscent of the works of the great Flemish masters of the Golden Age. The iconographic theme of the banquet is not, at the end of the seventeenth century, at all new to the history of art: Egyptian, Etruscan and Pompeian frescoes depict diners surrounded by luxury and beauty, mutated forms of the mythological "banquet of the gods". Among the most famous interpreters of this iconographic topos is certainly Veronese, author of banquets of extraordinary beauty exhibited in the most famous museum institutions worldwide. The theme of the banquet, which, in Italy, reaches its best results in the sixteenth century, enjoys a renewed popularity in the second half of the seventeenth century north of the Alps. This is evidenced by works by artists such as David Tenier the Younger, David Vinckboons, Pieter van der Plans and Hendrick Govaerts: the latter artist, who, during his training, stayed between the Polish court and Prague, remaining particularly fascinated by the pomp and opulence of those realities, insists on the rendering of precious fabrics and the glories of the architectures that surround the characters. The theme of the outdoor banquet, practiced especially in the '600 will prove successful in Flanders even in the eighteenth century.