# Hollyhocks and Other Flowers in a Vase [View the canonical artwork record]() ## Artwork - Artist: [HUYSUM, Jan van]() - Date: 1701-1750 - Technique: Oil on canvas, 62 x 52 cm ## Commentary Hollyhocks and Other Flowers in a Vase c. 1710 Oil on canvas, 62 x 52 cm National Gallery, London Dutch painters described the visible world with remarkable precision and one of the forms this description took was the still life. In the earliest years of the seventieth century still lifes often had a vanitas element. Among the apparently random accumulation of objects were clocks, snuffed-out candles, faded flowers and skulls, reminders of the passage of time and the inevitability of death and decay. As the century progressed these elements dropped away and still-lifes became simply displays of the rare, exotic, expensive and beautiful. Jan van Huysum, whose career spanned the first half of the eighteenth century, was the heir to this great tradition of still-life painting and, as far as floral still lifes are concerned, its greatest exponent. This painting is undated but must belong to the first half of his career before about 1720, when he began to paint more elaborate and artificial flower pieces, which are light in tone on light backgrounds, in an almost pastel palette. It probably dates from about 1710. Jan van Huysum lived and worked in Amsterdam. He was one of a dynasty of painters, having been trained by his father Justus van Huysum, also a still-life painter, and was later imitated by his younger brother, Jacob. <P> <TABLE ALIGN=LEFT CELLPADDING=5 BORDER=1 WIDTH=320 BGCOLOR="\#99CCCC"> <TR VALIGN=MIDDLE><TD><IMG SRC="/support/gif/listen.gif" BORDER=0 VALIGN=MIDDLE> Suggested listening \(streaming mp3, 2 minutes\):<BR><A HREF="\#" onClick="w=window.open \('/music1/schubert/schubert\_d431\_blumen.html', 'newWin', 'scrollbars=yes,status=no,dependent=yes,screenX=0,screenY=0,width=350,height=350'\);w.opener=this;w.focus\(\);return true"><B>Franz Schubert: Blumenlied \(Flower Song\) D 431</B></A> </TD></TR></TABLE> ## Related artworks - [Basket of Flowers]() - [Bouquet of Flowers \(detail\)]() - [Bouquet of Flowers in an Urn]() - [Bouquet of Flowers]() - [Flowers and Fruit]() - [Flowers]() - [Fruit and Flowers]() - [Fruit Still-Life]() - [Landscape with Ruin and Bridge]() - [Still-Life of Flowers]() - [Still-Life of Flowers]() - [Still-Life]() ## Attribution [Web Gallery of Art]()