Theodoor Smits Active Antwerp by 1657 - after 1671

This picture belongs to a group of  remarkably cohesive small-scale still lifes, all composed of similar elements: pipe, oysters, small crabs; some of which are signed.  The artist used to be known as Sauts, due to a misreading of the signature, and his first name is sometimes given in its alternative form of Dirk, due, perhaps to his use of the initial D in some of his signatures, although this probably stands for Dorus, the colloquial form of his first name.  We are grateful to Fred G. Meijer, who has defined Smits' oeuvre and his nomenclature, for endorsing the attribution of the present work.  Smits is probably the Theodoor whose name occurs frequently in the papers of the Antwerp-dealing dynasty of Forchondt in connection with fruit pieces exported by them in 1667-71 to Spanish Colonial America.