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(Antwerp 1634–1715 Mechelen) Adoration of the Shepherds, oil on canvas, 121.5 x 165 cm, unframed Provenance: sale, Christie’s, New York, 21 May 1992, lot 197 (as Circle of Jacob van Oost I); sale, Millon & Associés, Paris, 27 March 2015, lot 66 (as Attributed to Jean-Guillaume Carlier); art market, Belgium; where acquired by the present owner We are grateful to Jean-Pierre De Bruyn for confirming the attribution of the present painting on the basis of a photograph. The Flemish painter Jan-Erasmus Quellinus was born into the successful Quellinus family of artists. His father Erasmus Quellinus II (1607–1678) collaborated with Peter Paul Rubens and took over the latter’s position as leading artist in Antwerp following Rubens’ death in 1640. Jan-Erasmus was trained in Italy and spent time in Venice and Rome, where he joined the Bentvueghels, a group of Dutch and Flemish painters active between 1620 and 1720 and he was given the nickname Seederboom. Around 1660 he returned to Antwerp where he became a master in the Guild of St. Luke the same year and married Cornelia Teniers, the daughter of the artist David Teniers II, in 1662. His career was marked by large religious works, including altarpieces for churches in Brabant, and significant commissions for Emperor Leopold I, such as a series of 15 ceiling paintings depicting Emperor Charles V's life of which two are conserved in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna (inv. nos. 1766, 2452). While his style extended beyond his father’s classicism, it also incorporated the grandeur of Veronese, as well as incorporating elements of Palladian architectural and vibrant details.