Identifying the artist of this still life on copper has proved elusive, with the most likely candidates being Ambrosius Bosschaert the Elder (Dutch, 1573 – 1621) or Jan van Kessel the Elder (Flemish, 1626 – 1679). In seventeenth-century Holland, the pursuit of exotic flowers became a national obsession; not surprisingly, flower painters were among the best-paid artists of the age. In 1621, Bosschaert commanded a thousand guilders (the currency of Holland) for a single flower picture. His works have been called flower portraits—with each flower receiving the same detailed attention as a face in a portrait. Usually small scale and on copper—like the current example— Bosschaert’s paintings often combined flowers from different seasons, painted from separate studies of each specimen. It is not unusual to find the same flower, shell, or insect in several different pictures. Like his predecessors, Bosschaert sometimes included symbolic or religious meanings in his works, such as the brevity of life.
