Pieter Claesz.

With Kunsthandel Douwes, Amsterdam;

From whom acquired by a private collector, the Netherlands, 1955;

Thence by descent to the present collector.

N.R.A. Vroom, A modest message as intimated by the painters of the 'monochrome banketje', vol. II, Schiedam 1980, p. 147, cat. no. 760, reproduced (as Adriaen Kraen);

M. Brunner-Bulst, Pieter Claesz. der Hauptmeister des Haarlemer Stillebens im 17. Jahrhundert, Lingen 2004, pp. 172-175, 239, cat. no. 62, reproduced.

Signed and dated 1635, this large panel is a particularly fine example of the semi-monochrome still lifes painted by Pieter Claesz. at the height of his career. Enlivened by a wonderful but restrained array of golds, silvers, and beiges, this work is illustrative of the monochrome banketje tradition popularized in Haarlem in the 1630s and 1640s by Claesz. and his contemporary Willem Claesz. Heda (1593–1680). What sets this painting apart within Claesz.’s body of work is that it is a rare instance in which the Dutch artist employs a strong diagonal compositional scheme instead of his more frequented vertical or horizontal schemes–a choice that lends the scene a notable degree of dynamism and immediacy.

A cool and clear light illuminates this captivating arrangement of objects from the upper left. Set atop a table draped in a dark moss-colored cloth are sumptuous wares, vessels, and comestibles, whose varied surfaces, colors, and shapes serve as a pleasing visual counterpart to the voluminous and cascading folds of the white fabric partially draped and seemingly casually gathered across the table’s surface. Upon the table are three pewter plates, one with a bread roll and tobacco, one with oysters, and one with a peeled and sliced lemon. In the space between these plates are a knife and a variety of nuts. At the center of the composition, a gilt tazza rests atop an overturned glass roemer. Across the far edge of the table are a small glass of beer, a large pewter jug, and a soaring fluted wine glass. The pleasing contrast among all the objects–from the roundness of the bread roll to the tall delicacy of the wine glass, and from the hard and voluptuous jug to the soft white fabric whose folds are reflected upon its shimmering surface–all lend a brilliance to the scene. Such brilliance is further enhanced by the minute details Claesz. renders, including the small leaves of tobacco tumbling out of its paper vessel and the single lemon seed atop the plate.

Alongside Heda, Claesz. was one of the foundational figures in the development of the distinguished tradition of still-life painting in Haarlem in the second quarter of the seventeenth century. Although very little documentary evidence exists to shed light on the relationship between these two artists, the visual parallels in their paintings–particularly in their chosen motifs, compositions, and palettes–suggest that they were quite familiar with each other’s practice and output. Indeed, by the early 1630s, the slightly older Heda first began to incorporate themes found in Claesz.’s paintings for his own works. In comparing the present panel to Heda’s 1635 panel today of the same subject today in the Rijksmuseum,¹ the visual exchange between the two artists becomes unquestionably clear. Together they established a new manner of rendering everyday objects, using the effects of light, tone and meticulous detail to define space, volume, and form.

While Haarlem seems certainly to have been a bustling bastion of creativity for these two artists, the influence of still life artists from neighboring cities is palpable in their works, particularly during the 1630s. In the present painting, for example, an awareness of the works by the Amsterdam painter Jan Jansz. den Uyl (1595/6-1639), an exact contemporary of Claesz., seems unquestionable. This is particularly compelling when comparing this panel with its monumentality and elegance to Den Uyl’s 1633 Still Life of a pewter jug and a silver tazza on a table formerly in the collection of Cecil and Hilda Lewis but recently auctioned in July 2022.²

We are grateful to Dr. Fred G. Meijer for his assistance in the cataloguing of this entry.

¹ Inv. no. SK-A-4830, oil on panel, 87.8 by 112.6 cm., signed and dated lower edge, just right of center on the tablecloth: HEDA. 1635.

² Oil on panel, 90.4 by 71.7 cm., signed lower center with the artist’s owl device and dated center left, on the jug, 1633. Sold from the collection of Cecil and Hilda Lewis, London, Christie’s, 7 July 2022, lot 14, for £3,142,500.