An Allegory of the Elements, earth, air and water: Diana and her Nymphs after the Chase

This picture by Jan Breughel the Younger is closely related to the painting by Jan Breughel the Elder and Hendrick van Balen, sold at Christie's, New York, 31 January 1997, lot 14. That picture, which descended through the Bavarian princely collections to the Bayerisches Staatsgemäldesammlungen, where it hung in the Alte Pinakothek, Munich with a pendant (still in the Alte Pinakothek; see K. Ertz, Jan Breughel der Ältere, 1979, nos. 324 and 373, pl. 479 and fig. 478 respectively), in turn related to a group of cabinet-sized pictures depicting Diana and her hunt on which Jan Breughel I collaborated with Sir Peter Paul Rubens (ibid., cats. 354-7, figs. 464, and 471-3). Ertz suggested a dating of 1621 for the Jan Breughel I picture, based on the date of another collaboration between van Balen and Jan Breughel I, Allegory of Air (Paris, Musée du Louvre, no. 1920). Jan Breughel II probably trained in his father's studio, before travelling to Italy, where he spent some time with his childhood friend, Anthony van Dyck. He was forced to return to the Netherlands when his father died in 1625, at which time he took over his father's studio. Most of the Allegories of the Senses, the Elements, the Seasons and Abundance were executed in the 1620s, staying close to his father's model, and were often painted in collaboration with van Balen, Rubens and their respective studios. The attribution was confirmed by Klaus Ertz at the time of the previous sale in 2002.

A print by Wenzel Hollar exists for the hunting horn (see G. Parthey, Wenzel Hollar: Beschreibendes Verzeichnis seiner Kupferstiche, 1853, no. 2054).