(Hamburg 1658–1722 Rome)
A pair of still lifes,
one signed upper right: Christian B...,
oil on canvas, each 66 x 49.5 cm, framed, a pair (2)

We are grateful to Fred Meijer for confirming the attribution.

Berentz was one of the northern artists who became celebrated as a still life painter in Rome and he was employed by the collector and patron Marchese Niccolò Maria Pallavicini, who invited him to establish his studio in the Palazzo Pallavicini. Pascoli, Berentz’s biographer, describes how the artist was used by other Roman masters as a collaborator at a relatively early stage in his career. Carlo Maratta began working with him almost immediately (see L. Pascoli, Vite, 1730–36, II, p. 357–367). Evidence for this collaboration is given by several known works, such as the large still life dated 1696, today in the Galleria Nazionale di Capodimonte, Naples, as well as Berentz’s sumptuous still life executed in collaboration with Maratta and today in the Hermitage, Saint Petersburg. Berentz maintained a sharpness and clarity in his colourful compositions, comparable to works by other foreign artists working in Rome, such as Abraham Brueghel, and which followed the Northern traditions of still life painting (see L. Salerno, La Natura Morta in Italia, 1984, p. 260).