The Rubens Garden – a Masterpiece in Bloom
Klara Alen
Hannibal Books
The Italianate palazzo in Antwerp where the great artist and diplomat Peter Paul Rubens lived and worked is closed for restoration until 2030.
At the end of August, however, the newly restored garden of the Rubenshuis reopened to the public. To mark the occasion, Hannibal Books, based in the Belgian town of Veurne, has produced a book to heighten our appreciation that it was at least as important to its owner as the house.
The significance of the plant world in Golden Age Flanders is apparent in still life paintings that faithfully depict every specimen that painters could find. Jan Brueghel I’s bravura “Flowers in a Wooden Tub” represents 130 varieties.
It’s a celebration of what, we are told, artists of the time saw as the connection between body and spirit, earthly and heavenly kingdoms.
Rubens is better known for portraits and landscapes, but he was caught up in de tulpenmanie, regarded as the world’s first speculative bubble, when the price of tulip bulbs surged before collapsing in 1637.
The meticulous research that has informed the garden restoration and this thoughtful book established Rubens had contact with tulip speculators in Antwerp.
From the man himself, his only direct surviving reference to his garden is in a post-script to a letter to a friend who was looking after his Antwerp home while he was away.
“Also, remind Willem the gardener that he is to send us some Rosalie pears and figs when there are some, or any other delicacy from the garden,” he wrote, clearly missing the joys of home.
Willem was one of Rubens’ most highly paid and trusted staff and he was kept busy with a long list of tasks itemised in 17th-century gardening contracts, including weeding, grafting, sowing, digging, propagating, painting trellises and gates, and more besides.
It is one job that in essence has not changed, and the emphasis of the restoration and the accompanying book is on continuity and timelessness. It concludes with a beautifully illustrated florilegium of the plants that grew in Rubens’ time and bloom again – culminating in the tulip.
Barbara Lewis © 2024.
The Rubens Garden – a Masterpiece in Bloom
Klara Alen
Hannibal Books
The Italianate palazzo in Antwerp where the great artist and diplomat Peter Paul Rubens lived and worked is closed for restoration until 2030.
At the end of August, however, the newly restored garden of the Rubenshuis reopened to the public. To mark the occasion, Hannibal Books, based in the Belgian town of Veurne, has produced a book to heighten our appreciation that it was at least as important to its owner as the house.
The significance of the plant world in Golden Age Flanders is apparent in still life paintings that faithfully depict every specimen that painters could find. Jan Brueghel I’s bravura “Flowers in a Wooden Tub” represents 130 varieties.
It’s a celebration of what, we are told, artists of the time saw as the connection between body and spirit, earthly and heavenly kingdoms.
Rubens is better known for portraits and landscapes, but he was caught up in de tulpenmanie, regarded as the world’s first speculative bubble, when the price of tulip bulbs surged before collapsing in 1637.
The meticulous research that has informed the garden restoration and this thoughtful book established Rubens had contact with tulip speculators in Antwerp.
From the man himself, his only direct surviving reference to his garden is in a post-script to a letter to a friend who was looking after his Antwerp home while he was away.
“Also, remind Willem the gardener that he is to send us some Rosalie pears and figs when there are some, or any other delicacy from the garden,” he wrote, clearly missing the joys of home.
Willem was one of Rubens’ most highly paid and trusted staff and he was kept busy with a long list of tasks itemised in 17th-century gardening contracts, including weeding, grafting, sowing, digging, propagating, painting trellises and gates, and more besides.
It is one job that in essence has not changed, and the emphasis of the restoration and the accompanying book is on continuity and timelessness. It concludes with a beautifully illustrated florilegium of the plants that grew in Rubens’ time and bloom again – culminating in the tulip.
Barbara Lewis © 2024.
By Barbara Lewis • added recently on London Grip, art, books, painting • Tags: art, Barbara Lewis, painting