RUYSCH, Rachel
(b. 1664, Den Haag, d. 1750, Amsterdam)

Still-Life with Fruit and Insects

1711
Oil on wood, 44 x 60 cm
Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence

This luscious sample of life on Earth represents at least two passions of its time: taxonomy (or categorization) and still-lifes, which emphasize the pleasure of the senses and their ephemerality. Ruysch was court painter to the elector palatine Johann Wilhelm, who gave this painting and its pendant to his father-in-law, Cosimo III de' Medici.




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