Lot 27: Plums, strawberries, peaches, grapes, redcurrants and gooseberries with a finch, on a partly-draped marble ledge

Willem van Aelst (Delft 1627-after 1687 ?Amsterdam)
Plums, strawberries, peaches, grapes, redcurrants and gooseberries with a finch, on a partly-draped marble ledge
oil on panel
16 1/8 x 12¾ in. (40.9 x 32.4 cm.)

with Galerie Meissner, Zurich, from whom acquired by the following
Anonymous sale [The Property of a Gentleman]; Sotheby's, London, 10 April, 2003, lot 55, when acquired by the present owner.

The attribution was first proposed by Walther Bernt, and has been confirmed by Fred Meijer of the RKD, The Hague. Whilst Bernt suggested that the picture is an early work, dating it from around 1645, Meijer has suggested that it is closer to 1649, noting that a similar work, dated 1649, is now in the Prinsenhof Museum, Delft (formerly in the collection of Professor Einar Perman, Stockholm; see I. Bergstrom, Dutch Still-Life painting in the 17th Century, New York, 1983, p. 218, fig. 183, incorrectly recorded as dated 1646).