Abraham Brueghel established a reputation for his still lifes and in particular, floral still lives. One hunting still life signed and dated by him is known. Brueghel combined the Flemish preference for decorative profusion and anecdote with the sweeping movement of the High Baroque of his Italian contemporaries, such as
Michele Pace del Campidoglio and
Michelangelo Cerquozzi. The result of the complementary influences were compositions that appear casual, while maintaining strong composition and clarity of detail. He often collaborated with other specialist painters to create complex Baroque compositions. He usually painted the landscapes in these collaborations himself while the staffage was created by well-known Italian painters, such as
Carlo Maratta,
Giovanni Battista Gaulli,
Nicola Vaccaro and
Giacinto Brandi. A few collaborations between Abraham Brueghel and
Guillaume Courtois, a French painter active in Rome, are recorded. An example is the
Still life of fruits and flowers with a figure (Sold at Sotheby's on 29 January 2015 in New York, lot 302). The still life was painted by Brueghel while Courtois painted the figure. The painting is a variant of the
Grapes and pomegranate with a vase of flowers and a female figure (private collection), which has been dated to the end of the 1660s. He also collaborated with specialist landscape and
vedute painters to create collaborative works combining landscape and still life painting. An example is the
Flower garland and marine landscape of the Golf of Gaeta, a collaboration with vedute painter
Gennaro Greco. It shows in the centre a harbour scene with figures in the foreground which is surrounded by a flower garland. The work is characteristic of late 17th century Neapolitan painting which aimed almost exclusively at ornamental and decorative effect rather than at naturalism. This type of painting falls into the category of 'garland paintings', a type of still life invented in early 17th century Antwerp by Abraham's grandfather
Jan Brueghel the Elder. It became popular and leading Flemish still life painters, in particular
Daniel Seghers, helped spread the genre abroad. Paintings in this genre initially showed a flower or, less frequently, a fruit garland surrounding a devotional image. In the later development of the genre, the devotional image was replaced by other subjects such as portraits, mythological subjects, allegorical scenes and landscapes. ==References==