- Anonymous sale, London (Sotheby’s), 29 November 1961, no. 63

- The dealer Leonard Koetser, London, 1962

- Private Scottish collection and thence by descent until offered at anonymous sale, Edinburgh (Lyon and Turnbull), 15 November 2023, no. 186, as attributed to Rachel Ruysch

The present intimate still life is made up of just three peaches, a small bunch of grapes and a twig of cherries. The simple assortment is placed on a dark velvet cloth draped over a shadowed ledge. There are however more details that command our attention. One is the artist’s signature and date, lighting up against the deep shadow of the background in super-elegant curly script, as an integral part of the composition. Placed so prominently, this is a statement communicating the artist’s pride. In line with this is the trompe l’oeil fly in the centre. Already an established motif in fifteenth- and sixteenth-century painting, it was ‘a self-conscious representation of superior painterly prowess’, as one author has eloquently phrased it.[1] In addition however, its function could also be a Christian symbol of sin, corruption and mortality, so: vanitas. Both could be true in the case of our painting. Fruit being a foodstuff that easily decays, and the fly attracted to rotten food alludes to this. The fly as a reference to the power of painted perfect illusion was known as a commonplace in circles of artists, cognoscenti and with a cultured, learned audience. It echoes the well-known story of the ancient Greek painter Zeuxis (5^th century B.C.) who, as told by the Roman author Pliny the Elder (A.D. 23/24 – A.D. 79) in his Naturalis Historia, in competition with his colleague Parrhasius (active before 399 B.C.) painted grapes so real that it fooled hungry sparrows who tried to peck at them.[2] The Italian theoretician Antonio di Pietro Aver(u)lino known as Filarete (c. 1400 - c. 1469) is the earliest source for the fly myth in his Trattato di Architettura, written between 1461 and 1464.[3] But it became widespread through the mention of Giorgio Vasari (1511-1574) in his Vite.[4] It relates the story of Giotto (c. 1267-1337) as a pupil entering the studio of his master Cimabue (c. 1240-1302) who wasn’t there, finding a portrait in progress on an easel whereupon he painted a fly on the sitter’s nose. When his teacher returned, he repeatedly attempted to chase the fly away, demonstrating Giotto’s genius as a master of hyperrealism. Numerous versions of this story featuring other artists emerged since, all focusing on painting’s ability to deceive the viewer. The theoretician Giovanni Paolo Lomazzo (1538-1592) has Leonardo (1452-1519) in a dialogue tell Pheidias (5^th century B.C.) of the young Andrea Mantegna (c. 1431-1506) who fooled his teacher with a painted fly on the eyelash of a lion in his painting of St Jerome.[5] Rachel Ruysch’s fly, in keeping with her conspicuous signature, promotes its maker’s self-esteem through this illusionistic device. And on an intellectual level she may have had these art theoretical tales in mind, obviously addressing an educated audience familiar with the relevant sources and concepts. To Ruysch the fly may have had yet another meaning. The so-called musca depicta (Lat.: painted fly) could also symbolize the worthiness of even small, every-day creatures, according to the age-old idea that the greatness of God is manifested in every part of His creation. Ruysch’s father, the famous professor of anatomy Frederik Ruysch (1638-1731), was passionately interested not only in the human body, but in flora and fauna in the widest sense, and collected plants and small animals among them insects which he preserved with ground-breaking techniques. To his daughter Rachel Ruysch a fly certainly was more than just a lowly, small, ordinary thing. Nevertheless, Ruysch was well aware of the fly’s abject reputation, which she evokes by dramatically placing the filthy creature on the fresh and tasty (painted) fruit which heralds the fruit’s imminent decay (to which painted fruit of course is not subject).

Rachel Ruysch, arguably the most successful Dutch female artist in history, was born into a privileged family as the eldest child of Frederik Ruysch (1738-1731) and Maria Post (1643-1720), the daughter of the architect Pieter Post (1608-1669).[6] Quite soon the family moved to Amsterdam where Rachel at age fourteen was already painting. Her father being a talented draughtsman as well as a painter will have taught her to draw but Rachel learned painting from the Amsterdam still life artist Willem van Aelst (1627-1683). Her younger sister Anna also became an accomplished still life specialist but stopped painting when she married. In 1693 Rachel married the mediocre portrait painter Jurriaen Pool (1666-1745) but, although she was continuously pregnant until her 48^th (she bore him ten children!), she remained active as a professional artist. Since women were not allowed to register with the painters’ guild in Amsterdam, Rachel continued to paint for her clientele without being a member. In the summer of 1695 Johann Wilhelm, the elector Palatine (1658-1716), visited her father’s house to admire the latter’s world-famous anatomical preparations which included over 2,000 anatomical, pathological, zoological, and botanical specimens, preserved by revolutionary techniques, either drying or embalming. It is assumed that the elector also saw paintings by Rachel and the visit will have occasioned his first purchases of paintings by her hand. In any case, in 1708 she was appointed one of the elector’s court painters, receiving a yearly pension on top of the enormous prices she was paid for each of her still lifes separately. She remained in Amsterdam, however, occasionally making trips to the Düsseldorf court to deliver finished paintings. In addition to Johann Wilhelm, she also worked for a few other foreign princely patrons, such as the former’s father-in-law, the Grand-Duke of Tuscany, Cosimo III (1642-1723). By 1699 Rachel’s acclaim was such that she was the first female artist to be offered the membership of the painters’ confraternity Pictura in The Hague, which included permission to sell her work in the court city. In 1722 Rachel, Jurriaen and one of their sons had bought a lot in a lottery and won the astronomical amount of 75,000 guilders. Nonetheless, Rachel kept painting, until well into her eighties. In 1750, the year of her death, a book was published containing poems praising her art: Dichtlovers voor de uitmuntende schilderessen Mejufvrouwe Rachel Ruisch, a unique event for a female artist in the early modern era.

Our small painting is a juvenile work by Ruysch. Although it has briefly circulated on the art market in the 1960s, this exquisite signed and dated work was unknown to specialists.[7] Later in life Ruysch confessed she was able to paint just two works a year. Her total output produced during her long span of activity is estimated at 200 paintings maximum, making this signed and dated work an important piece.[8] Moreover, Ruysch’s fruit pieces are the least-known part of her oeuvre. Berardi was only able to identify six such works, making this the seventh.[9] These tabletop fruit still lifes all appear to be early production. They share some formal characteristics: they are all upright formats, sporting a dark background and the focus is on the leaves, stems, and tendrils. Together with an example from 1683, our painting of 1684 is the only dated fruit piece.[10] It is furthermore the only fruit still life in which the fruit is placed on a cloth instead of directly on a stone slab. Rachel’s teacher Van Aelst had died the year before and this work, painted when she was only nineteen or twenty years old, still breathes his influence, even extending to the style of the signature. Remarkably, even in her earliest preserved paintings it is impossible to find signs of inexperience of weaknesses. Here, Ruysch’s delicacy of touch can be admired throughout but especially in such fine details as the numerous dewdrops that are scattered over the fruit and cherry leaves.

Notes