Otto Marseus van Schrieck, called Snuffelaer

Abraham Fontanel (1741-1817), Montpellier;

From whom acquired by Jacques Joseph de Boussairolles (1741-1814), Montpellier, 10 February 1805;

Count de Saporta, Aix-en-Provence;

Private collection, Switzerland;

By whom anonymously sold, New York, Sotheby's, 11 January 1996, lot 72;

With David Koetser, 1996;

From whom acquired by Henry H. and June Weldon;

Their sale, New York, Sotheby's, 22 April 2015, lot 63;

Where acquired.

New Orleans, New Orleans Museum of Art, In the Eye of the Beholder: Northern Baroque Paintings from the Collection of Henry H. Weldon, 1997, no. 50;

Baltimore, Walters Art Gallery, An Eye for Detail: 17th-century Dutch and Flemish Paintings from the Collection of Henry H. Weldon, 20 June - 5 September 1999, no. 49.

J.J. de Boussairolles, L'Etat des Tableaux, [before 1814] under cat. no. 19;

A. Chevalier, La collection de tableaux de Jacques-Joseph de Boussairolles, 1741-1814: un collectionneur du début du XIX siècle à Montpellier, PhD Dissertation, Sorbonne 1984, p. 49, cat. no. 64, reproduced p. 84;

In the Eye of the Beholder: Northern Baroque Paintings from the Collection of Henry H. Weldon, exhibition catalogue, New Orleans 1997, pp. 129-131, cat. no. 50, reproduced in color;

An Eye for Detail: 17th-century Dutch and Flemish Paintings from the Collection of Henry H. Weldon, exhibition catalogue, Baltimore 1999, pp. 116-118, cat. no. 49, reproduced in color;

S. Steensma, Otto Marseus van Schrieck: Leben und Werk, Hildesheim 1999, p. 199, cat. no. B4.100 (incorrectly identified as cat. no. B1.73).

Otto Marseus van Schrieck was one of the leading innovators of the Dutch forest floor still life genre. Depicting creatures and plants of the forest undergrowth with meticulous detail, often in nocturnal settings, this sub-genre had a great vogue in the mid-seventeenth century. Marseus is thought to have trained in Amsterdam and is known to have traveled to England, France and Italy where he worked for Grand Duke of Tuscany, Ferdinand II de Medici. After his return to Amsterdam, he established his “Waterrijck,” or wetlands in the rural surroundings of Diemen where he cultivated plants and insects for his own study.¹ His nickname Snuffelaer, or ferreter, undoubtedly reflects his excursions into the forest underbrush to examine different specimens—sometimes even bringing them back to his vivarium, where they were further cultivated and studied. Much admired during his lifetime, his works were imitated by number of artists, including no less distinguished a talent than Rachel Ruysch.

In this work, he has focused meticulous attention on a thistle, a single pink flower, and a handful of forest dwellers, all of which glisten vividly against a darkened background. Working at a time of increased interest in the natural sciences, he is highly renowned for his detailed and dramatically lit nocturnal scenes that depict flora, moss and denizens of the forest. 

1. See A. van der Willigen and F.G. Meijer, A Dictionary of Dutch and Flemish Still-life Painters Working in Oils, 1525-1725, Leiden 2003, p. 139.