The Children of the Planet Mercury, Jan Brueghel (II), c. 1645 – (Jan Brueghel The Elder) ◄ Previous Next ►

Artist: Jan Brueghel The Elder

Date: 1645

Size: 70 x 92 cm

Technique: Oil On Canvas

This picture, unattributed in the 1976 museum catalogue, is a version of two others, which are both signed by Jan Brueghel II15 and there is no reason to doubt that much of it was also executed by him. Although the two versions and other works executed at this period are signed in full with a cursive hand, it is possible that the initials ‘IB’ on the side of the bale are indeed Brueghel’s and not intended as a merchant’s identification mark, which they might be taken to be. If that is the case, then the initials ‘IV’ on the front of the same bale could be those of another artist. The question then arises as to whether two hands can be detected as having executed the painting. The figures in Brueghel’s later compositions, many of which are signed, are independent of his father’s and his own early style but are by no means homogenous. While the landscape, buildings, animals and objects in the present work may be confidently assigned to Jan Brueghel II, the figures may not be his; indeed they could be the work of a collaborator with the initials IV. However, to whom the initials refer remains to be established, and it has to be said that no such initials have been recorded on other comparable works. Mercury is differently handled in the style of Willem van Herp I (? 1614-1677). The style of the collars worn by the children seems to be of the mid-1640s. Ertz dated the signed versions to the late 1640s.16 Relevant may be the fact that the series of the Planet Children by Maerten de Vos (1532-1603) was published in a second edition in 1645.17 No rendering of the Planet Children, the subject depicted here, is listed in Brueghel’s very intermittent record of paintings completed up to 1651.18 The 1976 museum catalogue describes the subject as The Apotheosis of Commerce and Trade, while Ertz called it An Allegory of the Topsy-Turvy World.19 De Tervarent in 1946 correctly identified one of the signed versions as depicting the children of the planet Mercury.20 In the sky is depicted the god Mercury identifiable by his winged hat (petasus) and the caduceus he holds; nearby are the pertinent signs of the zodiac – now faint because abraded – of Virgo and Gemini. Brueghel probably painted more than one series of the seven planet children, i.e. Sol, Luna, Saturn, Mercury, Venus, Mars and Jupiter, although no rendering of the children of the two last planets is extant. Of the extant paintings, a provisional count of six are on canvas (of which three, including the present picture, are of Mercury’s children) and measure approximately 75 by 95 cm, five are on copper with dimensions of approximately 70 by 80 cm and one is on panel, 78.7 by 95.2 cm.21 On the assumption that any one series would consist of works on identical supports and similar sizes, it is possible that the present picture may have been one in a series of which a Saturn’s Children, offered in an Amsterdam sale in 2004, was also part.22 Brueghel’s treatment of Mercury’s children is unusually comprehensive, as De Tervarent pointed out, even when compared with those depicted probably by Georg Pencz (c. 1500-1550)23 or by the late-fifteenth-century Housebook Master.24 The same cultivated impetus, perhaps relying on literary sources (as did the Housebrook Master) seems to have inspired Brueghel’s treatments of the children of Saturn, Sol and Luna; those of Venus are less elaborate or informed (although in one version the main protagonists were inspired by Anthony van Dyck (1591-1641). If these compositions are Brueghel’s invention, it points to a degree of sophistication not usually associated with him, or to an intellectual collaboration with a man of culture. As had previously been the case with Maerten de Vos, the main emphasis in the present work is on children learning (even if the standing child’s activity remains unclear). The squirrel nearby is a symbol of diligence.25 For the scenes in the loggia showing an artist at an easel in a studio and men of science round a library table, Brueghel would have found precedents in Pencz’s print. This has a legend which provides the key to the basic characteristics of the children: ‘Mercury’s children are full of art, and no one is their equal in dexterity…’ (Mercurius kind sind künstenreych- an behandigkeyt ist ihn nyemandt gleich…). That on a tapestry, inspired by the print and woven not long after it was published, was more expansive: ‘My nature is ardent as my appearance shows. My children are handsome and clever, and every occupation is fulfilled with passion’ (Feurig ist meine Natur wie Euch Erscheinung zeigt. Meine Kinder sind hübsch und geschicht und alles, was sie beschäftigt, erfullt sie mit Leidenschaft).26 That the loggia is to be associated with Mercury is indicated by the weight-driven chamber – or lantern – clock designed to hang high on a wall and here displayed against the column, as Mercury was the patron of clockmakers.27 Linked with the men of science within, who have the use of (?) terrestrial glob../..