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Still Life with a Basket of Fruit and a Bunch of Asparagus

Louise Moillon

1630

oil

panel

From the collection of Art Institute of Chicago

Baroque Dutch Golden Age Baroque Still Life

Dominant colour

About this work

This painting shows a simple tabletop with a basket of fruit and a bunch of asparagus. The artist, Louise Moillon, was just 20 when she painted this. She was already skilled, having trained with her father and stepfather. This was a time when still life paintings were becoming more popular. You can see more works like this by learning about the technique of chiaroscuro.

The story of this work

Overview

At a time when still life was emerging as a discrete subject (and not just an element of larger narrative works), this artist depicted fruit and vegetables arrayed on a simple tabletop with elegant clarity and naturalism. Louise Moillon trained first under her father and, from 1620, her stepfather. When she executed this still life at the young age of 20, she was already an accomplished painter. Women painters were not uncommon within the European tradition of the family workshop, which provided training, studio space, and clients for successive generations of artists. The system was one of…

Provenance

Gertrude D. Webster, Mass., probably to 1947 [Kleinberger archives, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York]. Sold, Plaza Art Galleries, New York, 6–8 November 1947, no. 234, as Dutch School, to Kleinberger, New York [annotated sale cat. in Frick Art Reference Library, New York]; sold by Kleinberger to the Art Institute through the Wirt D. Walker Fund, 1948.

Exhibition history

Paris, Galeries Nationales du Grand Palais, La Peinture française du XVIIe siècle dans les collections américaines, Jan. 29 – Apr. 26, 1982, cat. 73; New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art, May 26 – Aug. 22, 1982; Art Institute of Chicago, Sep. 18 – Nov. 28, 1982. Baltimore Museum of Art, Making Her Mark: A History of Women Artists in Europe, 1400-1800, Oct. 1, 2023 - Jan. 7, 2024, cat. 115; Toronto, Art Gallery of Ontario, Mar. 1, 2024 - July 1, 2024.

Read the full account in the museum source.