| One of seventeenth-century Holland's leading still-life painters, Willem van Aelst was famous in his day as a painter of flowers and, occasionally, fruits. He also helped develop the gamepiece (a still life consisting of dead game: hares, birds, hunting equipment, and so forth). He evolved a more ornate and elegant treatment of the gamepiece by about 1650 - a formula which set the stage for later specialists and which corresponds to the development of the banquet still life by his contemporary Abraham van Beyeren. Van Aelst was gifted in describing various objects and was particularly adept at rendering the textures of flowers, fruits, the coats of rabbits, and the feathers of birds. His impact on eighteenth-century artists (e.g., Oudry and Chardin) was considerable. In his own day, he was second only to Kalf* in influencing the development of Dutch still-life painting. Speculation about van Aelst's birthdate ranges from 1625 to 1626, although modern scholars accept 1627. After studying with his uncle, Evert van Aelst, Willem joined the Delft Painters' Guild in 1643. In 1645 he set out for France, working there until 1649, whereupon he moved on to Italy where he lived from 1649 to 1656. There he found employment part of the time with Ferdinand II de' Medici, the Grand Duke of Tuscany. In Italy van Aelst came to know Otto Marseus van Schrieck (whose pupil he might have been) as well as Schrieck's friend Matthias Withoos (who returned to Holland in 1653). Van Aelst joined the Schildersbent in Rome, where they nicknamed him The Scarecrow, an appellation he used on occasion as his signature (see his 16SS still life in the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam). In 1656 van Aelst returned to Delft, but in 1657 he moved to Amsterdam (then the center for still-life painting) and remained there for the rest of his life. Van Aelst's early works from the 1640s are relatively modest in scale, simple in composition, and are traditionally interpreted as seen in his fruit and flower still lifes dated 1643,1644. In the 1650s his style began to change and his subject matter became more complex. Dated examples of gamepieces (some sixty have been identified) appear from 1652 to 1681, and in these his treatment of decoratively arranged trophies and hunting equipment becomes increasingly sumptuous. His early dated examples done in Florence (for the Medici), dated 1652, combine game hung on pegs, with more strewn about on a cloth-covered slab, all demonstrating a virtuoso technique in rendering textures and colors, and underscoring the aristocratic tastes of those who engaged in hunts and prized images of their trophies. Van Aelst*s subtle play of colors, textures, and forms in the gamepiece reaches a particularly high level in his Hunting Piece (signed and dated 1668, Karlsruhe, Staatliche Kunsthalle). During the 1650s van Aelst also branched into pronk (sumptuous) still lifes of various kinds; an early example is the Still Life with Figs (signed and dated 1651 or 1657, Copenhagen, Statens Museum for Kunst), demonstrating his response to Kalf (and de Heem*). However, van Aelst's handling of paint is his own - his forms are crisper, more sharply delineated, his lighting less atmospheric. A fine later example, which shows his return to simpler arrangements in the 1670s, is the Still Life with Herring, Two Onions, and a Glass (signed and dated 1671, Vienna Academy of Fine Arts). In general, his still lifes of all kinds grew more modest in both size and composition in the 1670s and 1680s. Van Aelst also made a significant contribution to the development of the flower piece. During the 1650s and onward, he evolved a studied yet casual asymmetry in his flower arrangements and endowed his works with a sense of vitality and animation (on the whole) which was of considerable importance to such later flower painters as Rachel Ruysch (his pupil) and Jan van Huysum. ADDITIONAL WORKS: Amsterdam, R, Stilt Life with Poultry. Antwerp, KMSK, Still Life with Fruit and Accessories (1659), s. Basel, OK, Still Life (1679), s. Berlin, DMG, Game Piece (1660), s. SMG, Stilt Life with Birds and Game (1660); Game Piece (destroyed in WWII), (1653), s.; Banquet Still Life (1659), s. Bonn, RL, Flowers in a Silver Vase. Budapest, SM, Stilt Life with Fruit (1667), s. Cambridge, FM, Still Life with Flowers: Carnations and Roses (1670), s. Delft, SMP, Hunting Still Life. Deventer, Museum De Waag, Gemeentemusea van Deventer, Stilt Life of Fruit. Dresden, SGAM, Still Life (pendant to Basel painting) (1679), s. Florence, PP, Still Life with Dead Game (1652), s. Glasgow, GAGM, Still Life with Herring (1660). Goteborgs Konstmuseum, Still Life with Herring (1659), s. The Hague, M, Still Life with Dead Game; Still Life with Flowers (1663), s. Hamburg, HK, Booty (1679). Knssel, SKX, Stilt Life with Fruits (1677), s; Fruits on a Silver Platter (1677). Kiel, Stiftung Pommern, Still Life. London, Royal Collection, Game Piece with Birds (1657), s. Malibu, JPGM, Game Piece (1674), s. Munich, AP, Fowl and Hunting Equipment. Oxford, AM, Vase of Flowers (1663), s. Rotterdam, MBVB, Vase with Flowers in a Niche. San Francisco, MHYM, Flower Still Life (1663), s. Sarasota, RMA, Still Life with Dead Game, s. Schwerin, SM, Hunting Booty (1677), s. Stockholm, NM, Still Life with Dead Game (1664), s. Vaduz, Liechtensteinische Kunstsammlung, Still Life with Dead Birds (1663), s. BIBLIOGRAPHY: Ashmolean Museum 1950; Bergstrom, Dutch Stilt-Life Painting, 1956; Bernt 1948-1962; Haak 1984; Houbraken 1718-21; Lewis 1973; Sullivan, S. 1984; Warner 1928; Wright 1978. |
