Still Life with Cherries and Strawberries in China Bowls 1608

Curator: This is Osias Beert’s “Still Life with Cherries and Strawberries in China Bowls,” painted in 1608. Beert was one of the earliest artists to specialize in still life in the Netherlands. Editor: Immediately, I get a feeling of quiet luxury from it. All those overflowing bowls and delicate glass goblets are enticing. Curator: The opulence definitely speaks to the economic prosperity of the time, a period when the Dutch middle class was beginning to accrue significant wealth. What you see here are objects easily purchased on the open market in Antwerp, then controlled by Habsburg Spain. Editor: Those cherries look unbelievably succulent, almost cartoonishly red! It’s as if he’s trying to capture the ultimate, fleeting moment of perfect ripeness. And I spy with my little eye, that little dragonfly... Curator: That's exactly right, many artists employed these small natural elements as symbols within the bigger picture of still life, as reminders of mortality, and as the work decays naturally as well. Its inclusion lends the work an allegorical depth. Editor: It certainly works on me! The colors are so grounded and yet elevated. But tell me more about these objects he presents in his composition. What exactly makes them “status symbols?" Curator: At this time, Chinese porcelain bowls, the fruit themselves, the glasses were very prized commodities. The display shows the artist’s or perhaps a patron's possession of these rare treasures from the east and southern regions in Europe and Asia. Editor: There's a touch of drama here too, the dark backdrop making those vivid fruits seem to glow. Do you think that was deliberate on Beert's part? Curator: Absolutely. Baroque painters employed what's known as Tenebrism to heightened contrast with a darker composition. Beert presents this bounty as visually stimulating, ripe for a narrative of pleasure and fleeting temporal beauty, and very much aligned with Northern Renaissance styles too. Editor: Looking at the picture I would definitely eat some strawberries. Thinking about it as art history makes me ponder about the things in my surroundings. Curator: Exactly. Works such as these really give you an amazing portal into cultural ideas and tastes.