La Hollande en Fleurs, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Strasbourg, 18 June – 10 July 1949
Dordrechts Museum, Dordrecht, Boom, bloem en plant: Nederlandse meesters uit vijf eeuwen, 16 July – 31 August 1955, no. 42.
H. Terry-Engell Gallery, London, Silent World: exhibition of Still-Life Paintings by Old Masters, 25 October – 3 December 1960, cat. no. 14, illustrated in colour. 

A painter originally from Antwerp, Jan Baptist van Fornenburgh lived in The Hague from 1629 to 1649.  The style of his paintings suggests that he very likely received his training in Holland from an artist associated with the Bosschaert School.  His small oeuvre comprises mainly still lifes of flowers and fruit, the majority of which are in oil, but a few are in watercolour and gouache on vellum.  The artist often signed his works with a monogram – either IBF or IB.VF (IB linked), or very occasionally YAN BAT^a, as seen here, but very few are dated.

This colourful posy of flowers has the distinction of being not only one of Van Fornenburgh’s earliest known works, but also one of the few that is both signed and dated.  As such it is referenced in almost all the literature on the painter.  A simple bunch of flowers, including a striped tulip, a rose, a Martagon lily, an African marigold, a narcissus, an aquilegia, and a cyclamen, is arranged in a drinking glass (noppenglas), standing on a wooden ledge.  A few fallen petals, a fly and a dragonfly appear on the wooden surface beside it. 

In this early work, Van Fornenburgh adhered closely to the Bosschaert model in placing his compact arrangement against a dark background.  The vibrant colours and crisp delineation of the flowers is also in the Bosschaert manner.  Later, his backgrounds became lighter and his compositions more spacious.  The appealing simplicity of this intimate painting serves as a reminder that most Dutch floral still lifes were painted for the privacy of the home. 

Although accomplished, Van Fornenburgh was only inventive to a limited extent.  He was largely content to work within the tradition of flower painting established by Ambrosius Bosschaert the Elder (1573-1621) in the first quarter of the seventeenth century: namely, the representation of compact bouquets of flowers arranged symmetrically in a vase or drinking glass.  He was nevertheless alive to the flower paintings of his contemporaries, including those of The Hague artist Jacques de Gheyn II (c. 1565-1629), the Delft painter Jacob Vosmaer (1584-1641) and Balthasar van der Ast (1594/94-1657), Bosschaert’s brother-in-law whom he knew personally[i]. 

Like many other flower painters of his time, Van Fornenburgh’s arrangements do not show an existing bouquet, but were based on studies of individual flowers.  As a consequence of this working method, his bouquets often include flowers that bloom at different times of the year, as well as individual specimens that recur in more than one painting.  Here, for example, the French marigold and the Martagan lily are identical to specimens that features in a larger floral still life that was formerly with the Richard Green Gallery, in London[ii].  These same two flowers, together with the blue and white striped aquilegia, the narcissus and the pink rose also recur in a more elaborate bouquet of flowers that was formerly with the Hallsborough Gallery, in London[iii].  Sometimes, he also repeated his own compositions with only minor changes, substituting or varying just a few of the flowers in the arrangement, nor was he averse on occasion to lifting motifs from the works of other painters.  For instance, examples are known in which he incorporated elements from flower paintings by Vosmaer and Van der Ast[iv]. 

What motivated Van Fornenburgh to settle in The Hague is not known, but perhaps he saw an opportunity to carve out a niche for himself there as few still-life painters of flowers and fruit were working in the city in the first half of the seventeenth century.  From early on, we find references to flower pieces, both in oils and in watercolour, by ‘Jan Baptist’ in old inventories in The Hague, suggesting that he enjoyed quite a following in the city where the Stadholder had his court.  However, the fact that he left only a meagre estate suggests that he did not become wealthy from his art. 

BIOGRAPHY

Very little is known about the life of Jan Baptist van Fornenburgh.  A date around 1585/95 is usually given as the approximate date of his birth.  He probably came from Antwerp, and may have been the son of a painter called Peeter van Voornenborch, who entered the Antwerp guild in 1582.  He is first recorded in Amsterdam in 1621, when he is described as a painter acting as an art expert in a transaction between an art dealer from Antwerp and the painter Jacob van Nieulandt.  However, the document does not mention where he was resident at that time.  He was married to Susanneke van Goor, but neither the date nor the place of their marriage is known.  He seems to have been living in Vianen around 1624, where a son, also called Jan Baptist, was born, who went on to become an actor of some renown.  An older son, Barent, became a soldier and left for the East in 1631, but was killed in action.  It is unclear when Van Fornenburgh arrived in The Hague, but he is first documented as a member of The Hague painters’ guild in 1629.  He remained in the court city until his death in late 1648 or early 1649, when he is recorded as already deceased in a document dated 21 February 1649 concerning the transfer of his meagre estate to his creditors.