Fruit still life with a silver beaker

Fruit still life with a silver beaker



Painter: Jan Davidsz. de Heem
Colors: 23
Dimensions: 20 * 29 squares1 square is 10 * 10 dots, about 1 centimeter
Price: 500 €


Jan Davidsz. de Heem or in-full Jan Davidszoon de Heem, also called Johannes de Heem or Johannes van Antwerpen (ca. 17 April 1606 – before 26 April 1684), was a still life painter who was active in Utrecht and Antwerp. He is a major representative of that genre in both Dutch and Flemish Baroque painting.

Jan Davidsz. de Heem’s “Fruit Still Life with a Silver Beaker” follows a composition by the Haarlem painters Pieter Claesz. (1597–1661) and Willem Claesz. (1594–1680) Heda. An arrangement of tableware and fruit is displayed on a wooden table with a green tablecloth gathered into deep folds. The sunlight, clearly entering through a side window, animates the objects whose matt, shiny and reflecting surfaces suggest their tactile qualities. Down to the last detail, de Heem achieves remarkable realism in depicting the fruit and tableware, for example in the drops of water on the grapes that reflect the light. In his Teutsche Academie, published in 1675, Joachim von Sandrart, a contemporary of the artist, claimed that de Heem moved to Antwerp specially because “there one could have strange fruits of all manner of great plums, peaches, apricots, bitter oranges, lemons, grapes, and others, in better perfection and greater numbers, so that the same could be counterfeited from life”. Patrons also valued de Heem’s creative ability that was allied to the complex symbolism of the objects he painted. This still life might relate to the sacrament of marriage, as suggested by the walnuts, vine tendrils and the silver beaker that since Antiquity had played a role in wedding rites. This picture from the Princely Collections may well have been the perfect wedding present for somebody.

Fruit still life with a silver beaker

Fruit still life with a silver beaker