老扬·勃鲁盖尔一家的肖像

Rubens and Jan Brueghel the Elder shared panels for years in Antwerp, Brueghel putting in the flowers and the landscape, Rubens the figures. They were close outside the studio too, close enough that Rubens stood godfather to one of Brueghel's sons. No patron ordered this picture. It is his friend's family, painted around 1613 to 1615.

Catharina van Mariënburg sits at the centre with the two children, Pieter and Elisabeth. Pieter has hold of one of his mother's gemstone bracelets, and the same bracelets turn up in still lifes Brueghel painted himself. The Courtauld notes that Brueghel was added late, painted in over the dark ground once the rest was settled. In 1625 an epidemic went through Antwerp and killed him and both of the children here. Catharina lived another two years.