"In the early 17th century, Antwerp was a kind of Hollywood," said Paul Huvenne, director general of Antwerp's Royal Museum of Fine Arts. "There were more painters in the city than bakers!"

"Peasant Wedding Dance in the Open Air" (c. 1570-80) by Pieter Bruegel
"Equestrian Portrait of the Flemish Painter Cornelius de Wael" (c. 1625) by Antoon van Dyck
"Unequal Lovers" (c. 1520) by Quinten Massys
-- Antwerp Royal Museum of Fine Arts photos

Huvenne was speaking at the opening of "Masterpieces of Flanders' Golden Age" at the Isetan Museum of Art in Shinjuku. The first major exhibition of Flemish art to visit Japan, it comprises more than 70 paintings from the Bruegel family, Rubens, Van Dyck and other leading artists, drawn from Antwerp's leading collection of art. Touring the country until December, it offers the chance to see the kind of early landscapes, still lifes and floral paintings that influenced the Dutch school.

Stressing the need for timely conservation, Huvenne said two works had been specially restored for the exhibition. They are a fine portrait of Margareta of Austria, dated c. 1518-1530, in the first gallery, and a limpid "Landscape With Dancing Shepherds" (1631) by Jan Wildens in the last.

The head restorer, Lizet Klaassen, said the improvement after cleaning away centuries of grime was tremendous. It is rare for fragile panel paintings to travel, but they have literally "brought their own atmosphere with them," being sealed into protective cases in Antwerp before the journey.

The exhibition starts with a small but impressive selection of Northern Renaissance paintings, including two contrasting works by Quinten Massys, the leading painter of his time.

The first, in warm tortoiseshell colors, is a quiet tribute to the scholarly life. This was a suitable subject in the age of Humanism, and one Massys pioneered. The second, a genre painting of "unequal lovers" -- one old and lecherous and the other pretty and avaricious -- reveals his other talent for satirizing human weakness.

His son, Jan Massys, was also a painter and is represented here by a Madonna and Child in shimmering colors, backed in the Italian way with a small landscape.

As well as the religious turmoil of the Reformation and protracted wars of independence with Spain, the 16th century saw a cultural flux between artists of north and south. Pieter Bruegel, for example, was profoundly influenced by the Alpine scenery he saw en route to Rome in the 1550s.

Although there are no original paintings here by Bruegel (there are only about 40 throughout the world), there is a very old copy of "A Peasant Wedding Dance" and 23 other works by members of his "dynasty" -- his eldest son, Pieter the Younger, his youngest son, Jan the Elder, and their two sons (called Pieter and Jan, respectively).

What with hundreds of copies, both legitimate and fake, sorting one Bruegel/Breughel from another can be heavy going. However, Yoko Mori, a professor of art history at Meiji University, is a leading expert on the subject and helpfully points out the artistic differences in her catalog essay, supplemented by a family tree. Also, small portraits of each artist are on display, which is a pleasant touch.

Bruegel's sons were very young when he died, so they probably learned drawing from their artistic maternal grandmother, Mayken Verhulst van Bessemers.

But while Pieter spent all his life in Antwerp, satisfying the huge demand for copies of his father's paintings, Jan traveled widely and produced original work for the courts of Europe. He made his reputation with superb floral paintings and idealized landscapes, sometimes adding genteel versions of his father's lively scenes of peasant life. Jan also collaborated with his friend Peter Paul Rubens, who was the guiding star of Antwerp's cultural rebirth after the Spanish sacked the city in 1585.

Among several fascinating copies from the workshop of Pieter the Younger is the famous "Netherlandish Proverbs." Over 80 proverbs are acted out in this busy village scene. Among various foolish or futile things, people feed roses to swine, make bonfires while their houses burn and try to shear the fleece off a pig.

For all their popularity, Pieter the Younger did not grow rich on copies. One of his small roundel paintings of proverbs, shown in the exhibition, might have sold for seven florins, but his younger brother's original work would have fetched nearly 100 times that amount.

Continuing a family tradition, Jan Brueghel's own son also produced versions of his father's work. Here we have his remarkable "Holy Family in a Garland," dated from about 1630. In this glorious Rococo fantasy, a riot of turnips, cabbages and angels holding spring onions frame the Virgin and Child.

Among the superb still lifes, for which Flemish painters were renowned, are dewy flowers by Daniel Seghers that seem to spring right off the canvas and a dramatic "Vanitas" by Franciscus Gysbrechts. Amid musical instruments, legal documents and other symbols of pleasure, wealth and ambition are some frail, broken straws and a human skull. Combining life's richness with a moral warning, it seems to sum up this and every passing golden age.