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©
Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid
Jan Davidsz. de Heem

Flowers in a glass Vase with Fruit

ca. 1665
Oil on panel.
53.4 x 41 cm
Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid
Inv. no.
182
(
1964.4
)
ROOM 21
Level 2
Permanent Collection
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 14 13 15 16 17 18 22 19 20 21 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 Recommended start of the visitClassical rooms
1 14th Century. Early Italian Painting 2 15th Century. German and Spanish Painting 3 15th Century. Early Netherlandish Painting 4 15th Century. Italian Painting 5 15th and 16th Centuries. Renaissance Portraiture 6 16th Century. Villahermosa Gallery 7 16th Century. Italian Painting 8 15th and 16th Centuries. German Painting 9 15th and 16th Centuries. German Painting 10 16th Century. Netherlandish Painting 11 Tiziano, Tintoretto, Bassano and  El Greco 12 17th Century. Caravaggio and Baroque Painting 13 17th Century. Italian, French and Spanish Painting 14 17th Century. Italian, French and Spanish Painting 15 17th Century. Italian, French and Spanish Painting 16 18th Century. Italian Painting 17 18th Century. Italian Painting 18 18th Century. Italian Painting 19 Classical rooms 20 Classical rooms 21 Classical rooms 22 18th Century. Italian Painting 23 17th Century. Dutch Painting. Landscape 24 18th Century. French and English Painting 25 17th Century. Dutch Painting. Scenes of Daily Life and Interiors 26 17th Century. Dutch Painting. Landscape 27 17th Century. Dutch Painting. Portrait 28 17th Century. Dutch Painting. Landscape 29 19th Century. European Painting. Goya and Romanticism  
This still life with a vase of flowers has been attributed to Jan Davidsz. de Heem. Born in Utrecht, De Heem moved with his family to Leiden in 1625 and his first known works date from that decade. At this period he focused on still lifes and his most important paintings are compositions with piles of books, documents, papers and musical instruments, painted in a restrained palette with an emphasis on whites, browns and greys. These compositions have been interpreted as vanitas themes and clearly refer to the intellectual life and to knowledge. In the 1630s the artist moved to Antwerp where he remained until around 1658. In Antwerp, De Heem made contact with the Flemish school and his painting became more complex and elaborate. His still lifes of this period depict large tabletops with a wealth of foodstuffs, objects and animals in a stepped arrangement framed by elaborate curtains and including a landscape in one corner. His work from his earliest years onwards reveals an outstanding ability to interpret colour, a feature that was further developed during his Antwerp period.

Flowers in a glass Vase with Fruit reveals the influence of another great still-life painter, Daniel Seghers. In the present work De Heem has abandoned the use of a symmetrically balanced bouquet and depicts a more natural, free arrangement. In addition to the roses, lilies, irises, daisies, peonies and bindweed that provide the principal motifs he also adds pieces of fruit such as the mandarins, cherries, strawberries and acorns arranged on the ledge, as well as some delicate ears of corn. The composition and arrangement of the elements is typical of De Heem, who produced a number of works similar to this one at around this time. Typical features include the use of a dark background in which the light defines areas of the ledge or its edge and the depiction of the interior of the vase through which we see precisely defined stalks such as those of the roses with their thorns. Another recurring motif is the inclusion of the reflection of a window on the surface of the vase. De Heem balanced the composition, placing the largest, most fully opened flowers in the centre while the smallest flowers and the stalks lean over the edge of the vase, and the fruit on the right balances the weight of the roses.

The inclusion of flowers such as the iris at the top, which is the symbol of the Virgin, has led to the suggestion that the work includes elements of religious symbolism. This is further reinforced by the anemone that refers to the transitory nature of life, and to the ears of corn, symbol of the Resurrection, of eternal life and the Eucharist. Gaskell, however, emphasised the fact that these compositions should primarily be seen as a display of the painter’s abilities in the depiction of the animal and plant world. The re-use in various works by the artist of some of the elements on the tabletop such as the rose that leans over to the left indicates that De Heem made use of sketches and drawings in the preparation of his works.

Mar Borobia
17th Century17th Century - Dutch paintingPaintingOilpanel
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Flowers in a glass Vase with Fruit. Florero con vaso de cristal y frutas, c. 1665
Flowers in a glass Vase with Fruit
Jan Davidsz. de Heem

©

Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid

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Flowers in a glass Vase with Fruit. Florero con vaso de cristal y frutas, c. 1665
Flowers in a glass Vase with Fruit
Jan Davidsz. de Heem

©

Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid

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