Vase of Flowers with Roses, Narcissi and Tulips

Phoebus Focus VI

On the smooth curved surface of a glass vase a window is reflected. Light filters through that window into the painter’s studio, which is also a monastic cell. Paintings by Daniel Seghers (1590-1661) may adorn the halls of kings and princes, but the artist himself has chosen an austere existence within the walls of a Jesuit community.

The Roses, Narcissi and Tulips in a Glass Vase from The Phoebus Foundation collection is a subtle triumph over the inexorable passage of time. The flowers have not faded. The window of Seghers’s humble studio is still reflected in the vase. This work of art is a gateway to a vanished world, the seventeenth-century universe of Daniel Seghers.