Still Life with Fruit and a Bird

DPG433 forms a pair with DPG350; the two were probably intended as overdoors or overmantels to be set within a wooden panelled interior. The handling of the fruit in these two pictures is identical to that found in the "Still Life with Fruit, Flowers and Crayfish" (DPG406): they may well be by the same follower of Jan Paul Gillemans I, who was well known for his garlands of flowers and fruit. These two canvases are autumnal in feel, and the maize (a new World import) is a tribute of Abundance in Cesare Ripa's "Iconologia" (1593/1603), a highly influential reference book of symbolic and emblematic images.