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A sprig of flowering rosemary lying against an ivory-white background and the twelve insects that surround it fills this horizontal painting. Stretching nearly the length of the composition with the cut end to our left, the rosemary has blunted, needle-like, gently curling teal-green leaves and small periwinkle-blue flowers along the ash-brown stem. Several insects perch on the sprig while others are seen as if looking from overhead, resting on the white background. The three largest insects perch along the top of the sprig, with an ivory-white butterfly with moss-green and black markings to the left, a black and golden, fuzzy bumblebee near the center, and a lemon-yellow butterfly with red antennae to our right. A tiny red insect, perhaps a ladybug without spots, sits on a leaf between the bee and yellow butterfly, and a small wasp-like insect rests on a leaf in at the lower left. Another mosquito-like insect alights on the surface nearby, next to a beetle with a honey-orange body with black, almost tiger-like stripes. A large cockroach sitting near the lower right corner has six spindly legs, a mahogany-colored abdomen, a black thorax, and tiny, black head. Spaced somewhat evenly across the top of the panel are a brick-red, winged insect to the left, a mint-green, beetle-like bug near a moth patterned with bone white and black, and a black, fly-like insect to our right. Lit from the upper left, the rosemary and insects cast shadows on the surface. The artist signed and dated the work with gray in the lower left corner: “J v. kessel . . f. Ao 1653.”

Jan van Kessel the Elder

Insects and a Sprig of Rosemary, 1653

Not on View

Medium

oil on copper

Dimensions

overall: 11.5 × 14 cm (4 1/2 × 5 1/2 in.)

Credit Line

The Richard C. Von Hess Foundation, Nell and Robert Weidenhammer Fund, Barry D. Friedman, and Friends of Dutch Art

Accession Number

2018.41.1

Artists / Makers

Jan van Kessel the Elder (painter) Flemish, 1626 - 1679

Image Use

This image is in the public domain.
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Inscription

lower left: J v. kessel . . f. Ao 1653

Provenance

Private collection, Sweden, by 1934. (Richard Green, London); purchased July 1982 by Paul Mellon [1907-1999], Upperville, Virginia; by inheritance to his wife, Rachel Lambert Mellon [1910-2014], Upperville; (her estate sale, Sotheby's, New York, 10 November 2014, no. 31); (Johnny Van Haeften, Ltd., Ham, near Richmond); purchased 29 June 2018 by NGA.

Associated Names

Green, Richard
Mellon, Paul
Mellon, Rachel Lambert
Private Collection (NGA Former Owner)
Sotheby's
Van Haeften Ltd., Johnny

Exhibition History

1934: De Helsche en de Fluweelen Brueghel. En Hun Invloed op de Kunst in de Nederlanden, Kunsthandel P. de Boer, Amsterdam, 1934, no. 295.

1982: Exhibition of Old Master Paintings, Richard Green, London, 1982, no. 29.

Bibliography

1982: Advertisement for Richard Green's June 1982 Exhibition of Old Master Paintings, The Connoisseur (June 1982): 59. repro.

1983: Greindl, Edith. Les peintres flamands de nature morte au XVIIe siècle. Brussels, 1983: 365, no. 3.

1990: Segal, Sam. Flowers and Nature: Netherlandish Flower Painting of Four Centuries. English translation by Ruth Koenig. Amsterdam, 1990: 209, fig. 47a.

1997: Tongiorgi Tomasi, Lucia. An Oak Spring Flora: Flower Illustration from the Fifteenth Century to the Present Time: A Selection of Rare Books, Manuscripts and Works of Art in the Collection of Rachel Lambert Mellon. Translated from Italian by Lisa Chien, with bibliographical descriptions by Julia Dupuis Blakely. Upperville, 1997: 106.

2003: Meijer, Fred G. Dutch and Flemish Still-Life Paintings Bequeathed by Daisy Linda Ward. Waanders, 2003: 230 n. 6.

2012: Ertz, Klaus, and Christa Nitze-Ertz. Jan van Kessel der Ältere 1626-1679, Jan van Kessel der Jüngere 1654-1708, Jan van Kessel der 'Andere' ca. 1620 - ca. 1661: kritische Kataloge der Gemälde. Lingen, 2012: 262, no. 378, repro. (with erroneous de Boer provenance).