This is the only known signed and dated painting by van Suchtelen. It surfaced onto the art market at Drouot in Paris February 4th 1991.

 

We received the following text from Fred Meijer:

 

“This still life of flowers in a vase is clearly signed ‘Suchtelen’, but the initial is complex and indecipherable. No professional painter by that name is registered, but an informed guess as to the painter’s identity can be made. 

 

Stylistically, this floral still life is related to examples by Jacob Rotius (1644 – 1681/82), a painter from Hoorn, who was influenced by Jan Davidsz. de Heem (1606 – 1684) for such work.

 

The van Suchtelen family was important in Hoorn, so we may assume that the painter belonged to this family. The most likely candidate is Nicolaas van Suchtelen, who was a magistrate and later in life burgomaster of Hoorn. The complex initial may, in fact, well include an N.

When the estate of Nicolaes van Suchtelen was auctioned in 1715, it include several still lifes, among others by Rotius and by de Heem, as well as ‘his own portrait, life size, painted by himself’, which indicates that he was indeed a(n amateur) painter. The present painting may not have been the only flower piece he painted, as a garland of flowers in the manner of de Heem and also dated 1675 was auctioned in 1811 (as by C. van Suchtelen) and a ‘beautiful flower piece by van Zuchtelen’ was auctioned in Gouda in 1792.” 

 

Adriaan van der Willigen and Fred Meijer pointed already (in their “A Dictionary of Dutch and Flemish Still-life Painters Working in Oils, 1525 – 1725”, 2003, P. 192) to Jacob Rotius through whom the influence of Jan Davidsz. de Heem and of Abraham Mignon reached our painter.

 

 

Because this stunning Baroque flower still life contains a vivid micro cosmos of diverse insects: butterflies, mots, dragonflies, a spider, a fly, a caterpillar, a snail and a grasshopper.