SPAENDONCK, Gerard van
(b. 1746, Tilburg, d. 1822, Paris)

Still-Life

1783
Oil on canvas, 46 x 38 cm
Private collection

Gerard van Spaendonck was the foremost European painter of floral and fruit still-life at the end of the 18th and the beginning of the 19th centuries. In his lifetime he achieved great renown as the heir of the tradition of flower painting of which Jan van Huysum had been the principal exponent in the preceding generation.

The present still-life depicts narcissus, hyacinth and other flowers in a brown porphyry vase. Its companion piece depicts roses, hyacinth, wallflower and other flowers in a lapis lazuli vase.