Hyacint 1737

Laurens van der Vinne created this watercolour drawing of a Hyacinth. The Dutch Golden Age had a well-documented obsession with tulips. By the time that Van der Vinne was painting, a mania for hyacinths was in full swing. As we can see from the intense detail here, the flower had become an object of scientific scrutiny as well as aesthetic pleasure. The passion for botany can be seen as an emerging sense of Dutch national identity, shaped by its extensive trade routes. It was through the global trading networks of the Dutch East India Company that exotic plants and flowers entered Dutch society and these were cultivated in the famous Hortus Botanicus in Leiden. To understand the status of the artwork at the time, archival records would be invaluable to understand how much the artwork sold for. This would give a vital insight into the Dutch art market at the time and the impact of trade.