Lot 5: NICOLAES VAN VEERENDAEL ANTWERP 1640 - 1691 A STILL LIFE OF VARIEGATED TULIPS, A ROSE, CARNATION,

NICOLAES VAN VEERENDAEL ANTWERP 1640 - 1691 A STILL LIFE OF VARIEGATED TULIPS, A ROSE, CARNATION, AN IRIS AND OTHER FLOWERS IN A GLASS VASE, RESTING ON A STONE LEDGE DRAPED WITH A CLOTH, TOGETHER WITH A BUTTERFLY

oil on canvas

PROVENANCE

The Earl of Plymouth;
With Leonard Koetser Gallery, London, 1950 (Witt Library mount);
Graham Baron Ash, Esq., Wingfield Castle, Diss, Norfolk;
His sale ("Property removed from Wingfield Castle"), London, Christie's, 4 October 1967, lot 128, for 780 gns. to Leggatt's;
With Leggatt Bros., London.
EXHIBITED

London, Royal Academy of Arts, Flemish Art 1300-1700, Winter Exhibition 1953-4, no. 341.
LITERATURE AND REFERENCES

Flemish Art 1300-1700, exhibition catalogue, London, Royal Academy of Arts, Winter Exhibition 1953-4, cat. no. 341, reproduced p. 60.
CATALOGUE NOTE

Veerendael was one of the most important flower painters active in Antwerp during the second half of the 17th Century. His paintings show a remarkable attention to detail and the artist was much admired for this even in his own day. Indeed the 18th-century biographer Weyerman wrote of Veerendael that it sometimes took him four days to finish painting a single flower (see De Levensbeschryvingen der Nederlandse Konstschilders en Konstschilderessen, vol. III, 1729, pp. 234-6). Here the highly naturalistic rendering of droplets in the foreground and reflection in the glass vase is remarkable for its verisimilitude.

When the painting appeared at auction in 1967 another still life by Veerendael, of the same dimensions but on panel, signed and dated 1677, was sold as the subsequent lot (lot 129). Chronology of Veerendael's oeuvre is difficult to establish but a comparison between that picture and the present canvas would suggest that a dating in the second half of the 1670s for the present work seems reasonable. This is further substantiated by a comparison with another picture by Veerendael, also signed and dated 1677, belonging to the Winn family and on loan to Nostell Priory, National Trust (see G. Gordon, in Masterpieces from Yorkshire Houses. Yorkshire Families at Home and Abroad 1700-1850, exhibition catalogue, York, York City Art Gallery, 29 January - 20 March 1994, p. 104, cat. no. 66, reproduced).

We are grateful to Fred G. Meijer for endorsing the attribution to Veerendael on the basis of a colour transparency.

56.3 by 43 cm.; 22 1/8 by 17 in.