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17 November 2009
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Flowers in a Glass Vase
1614
26 x 20 cm
oil on copper


These flowers would never in reality have appeared together. They bloom in different seasons, and the cost of such a bouquet would have been prohibitive in 17th Century Holland.

At the pinnacle of the display is a white tulip feathered with red. These sought-after markings were characteristic of Semper Augustus, the most costly tulip ever sold. At the height of the tulip boom in the 17th Century a single Semper Augustus fetched sums equivalent to the cost of about fourteen Bosschaert paintings.

Bosschaert wants us to know that the earthly loveliness of the flowers is transient. A sense of passing beauty and decay are conveyed by the fly in the foreground, and by the caterpillar, which marches up the stalk of the red and yellow tulip, ready to devour it.


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Flowers in a Glass Vase

Flowers in a Glass Vase
Ambrosius Bosschaert the Elder
National Gallery, London


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Your Perspective

Helen Dumbo
i think its really pretty!

saraya bernal london
absolutley fantastic love the colour contrast !

Star, America
I'm speechless. The varigated tulips, the daffodils, the Rosa Alba, the daisies and peonies are just beautiful.

emma starkey
i think this is an very colourful and orignal piece of art

Yvonne Kent
Makes me want to try harder but I know I will never be able to paint a picure with such skill

Harriet from Reading
Beautiful flower picture - I too am using it for an art project on house plants. Unfortunately mine didn't turn out this good!

Erica
The picture is beautiful. I like it so much I used it for an art project!

rehana dalwai london
the flowers look very real and delightfully amazing to have them on your wall, I just love flowers.

Bastiaantje van Loan Netherlands
I love fotographing flowers in my garden. Whenever I see the perfection and beauty, I just have to picture them, to catch that eternal, great moment of beauty. This picture has the same attraction of perfection and beauty, caught on canvas in that time and age. Even the carterpillar and the fly, cannot damage that sense of beauty and perfection. And the butterfly just crowns it. Lovely and enchanting. I want to sse it.

Mark from Houston
From one of my poems: Or Bosschaert's blooms well blown, Inviting the most charming flies.

Aynel Vechi
It delighted me to see this painting, the colours the arrangement, it just hit my heart and took up residence, the detail simply took me to a special place, thank you for the experience.

Akila from India
It is a lovely bouquetwith such gorgeous tulips. The butterfly in the painting indicates the beauty and attraction of the nature, but the fly speaks about the environmental pollution created by man.

Lorna, Paisley
It reminds me of flowers from my garden. No matter how I try not to, I always bring in some ugly insect with the beautiful flowers.

Aoife ,Delft
when I see the Ambrosius Bosschaert the Elder, I notes a fly walk away and a butterfly rest on it.It alwaise makes me feel that the picture is so beautifull its to beautifull for a dirty fly and perfect for a butterfly.

Olive, London
I always thought that those patterned tulips were some kind of modern hybrid but clearly not. Interesting detail of the butterfly on the left hand side but then the more sinister bug on the ground before the vase.



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