Forever Flowers: Mastery and Meaning of Flower Paintings in the Low Countries (1600-1700)

A beautifully produced, close-up look at nature and flowers in the art of the late medieval Low Countries.

If flowers could talk...

In Forever Flowers, conservator Sven Van Dorst offers a different perspective on a vibrant genre, the seventeenth-century Flemish flower still life. His detailed exploration of eight magnificent pictures in the collection of The Phoebus Foundation is a search for the secrets that lie beneath the brushstrokes of Jan Brueghel I, Daniel Seghers, Jan Davidsz. De Heem, and their fellow flower painters.

With the latest in modern analysis and imaging technologies as well as reconstructions of historical techniques he penetrates the deepest layers of their works, bringing to light features not seen for nearly four hundred years. For hidden behind the apparent simplicity of a flower piece are coded meanings and astonishing painting processes.

The wealth of razor-sharp detail images in this richly illustrated book reveals many surprising inventions and discoveries about exotic flowers, butterfly wings, and... a llama. Each flower still life tells a story. Of perilous journeys, status and prestige, fear of death, love for a child, or our search for knowledge in a world that is ever-changing even as we try to hold on to it.

For flowers do talk, and through these pages you can hear them.

This book is published on the occasion of the exhibition ’Garden of Delights. The Seventeenth Century in Bloom.’ at Kadriorg Art Museum in Tallinn, on view from 30 August 2025 to 25 January 2026.

Sven Van Dorst (1990) gained his master’s degree in conservation and restoration from the Royal Academy/University of Antwerp. After working at the Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp, he completed his training at the Hamilton Kerr Institute, a department of Cambridge University. In 2016, he founded the conservation studio of The Phoebus Foundation. As head of the studio, Sven assembled a team of passionate conservators and conservation scientists who manage the Foundation’s collection on a daily basis. Among the paintings he has treated are works by masters such as Peter Paul Rubens, Jacob Jordaens, Anthonis Mor and Michaelina Wautier. Between 2017 and 2020, Sven led the research and restoration project of the panels of the Dymphna altarpiece by Goossen Van der Weyden. His fascination with the painting technique and materials of Baroque flower painters has already led to two editions - on Daniel Seghers and Jan Brueghel I - of the Phoebus Focus series.