Still life with flowers in a glass vase - Nicolaes van Veerendael

NICOLAES VAN VEERENDAEL
Antwerp 1640 - 1691
“Still life with flowers in a glass vase on a stone table ledge”
Oil on canvas
Signed lower right: “Nicolaes van Verendael”
Dimensions: 50 x 39 cm, 63 x 50 cm (framed)
THE ARTIST

Nicolaes van Veerendael was a Flemish painter active in Antwerp, best known for his flower paintings and vanitas still lifes. He also painted a number of singeries: humorous scenes with monkeys dressed and acting like humans. Despite his high reputation among fellow artists, Van Veerendael struggled financially throughout his life. He was a slow and meticulous worker, and according to the eighteenth-century biographer Jacob Campo Weyerman, he sometimes needed four full days to finish a single flower. As a result, he lived modestly, even though he was very skilled and his work was widely admired.

Van Veerendael was in high demand as a collaborator and worked with some of the leading Antwerp painters of his time, including David Teniers the Younger, Gonzales Coques, Erasmus Quellinus II, Jan Boeckhorst, Carstian Luyckx and Jan Davidsz. de Heem. In many cases, he added the still-life elements to their compositions.

His early work shows the influence of Daniel Seghers, the great Antwerp flower painter, though Van Veerendael tended to use stronger color contrasts. In his early years, he painted small, graceful bouquets in tall, narrow vases or garlands framing religious figures and scenes. Later, under the influence of Jan Davidsz. de Heem, he moved towards more varied, looser, and richer floral arrangements, applying a swifter brushstroke. In doing so, he developed a more personal style that foreshadowed Flemish flower painting of the eighteenth century. Some of his works also included small details like insects, which further enhanced their sense of naturalism.

Although admired by his peers and remembered today as one of Antwerp’s great still-life painters, Van Veerendael’s career was marked by his perfectionism and his slow pace of work. His dated paintings, which range from 1659 to 1690, give us a clear picture of how his style evolved across three decades.


THE ARTWORK

Van Verendael often dated his paintings, which makes it possible to trace his development with some accuracy. This painting could be placed in the 1670s, when his floral bouquets became more abundant, diverse, and naturally arranged under the influence of Jan Davidsz. de Heem.

The composition shows a lavish bouquet set in a glass vase against a dark background, which makes the colors of the flowers stand out with striking clarity. Among the identifiable blooms are pink and white roses in the center and left of the arrangement, a red-and-white striped tulip at the top, vivid red flowers that resemble carnations or peonies, a white hibiscus-like flower with a dark center, clusters of small daisies, small blue forget-me-nots, and bright yellow and orange blossoms, perhaps marigolds. In addition, a butterfly adds a touch of life and movement.

Like many seventeenth-century still lifes, this painting may carry symbolic undertones, though we cannot be sure whether Van Verendael himself intended them. At the time, the meanings of flowers were commonly understood: roses could symbolize love or the Virgin Mary, lilies purity, tulips nobility and wealth. Decaying petals reminded viewers of the brevity of life, while exotic and rare blooms reflected the status of the patron. Yet above all, such still lifes were painted to amaze and delight, showcasing the painter’s skill and precision.

These works were often composed from studies made across different seasons, sometimes even over the course of a year. Artists developed techniques to preserve flowers and insects so they could be faithfully recorded. This makes Van Verendael’s bouquet not only a demonstration of artistic virtuosity, but also a document of the plants admired in seventeenth-century Europe.

Interestingly, modern researchers have even used paintings like this to study the history of cultivated plants. For example, the striped tulip in this bouquet belongs to a long tradition of depictions of ornamental tulips, which can be traced back as early as the twelfth century in Northern Italy and the fifteenth century in England.

In the end, however, the painting’s primary purpose remains clear: to astonish the viewer with its beauty and its extraordinary detail.