CAREL BORCHAERT VOET (1671-1743)

Still life with exotic plants, butterflies and grapes near a rock. Panel (mahogany). Signature in the lower right. Provenance and certificate: Guy Folkner, 4.5.1977 Carel Borchaert Voet is born in Zwolle in 1671. From 1689 to 1690 he works in England in the service of Hans Willem Bentick (1649-1709), earl of Portland. For him, he paints a series of 12 still lifes with baskets with flowers and fruit next to some other landscapes depicting the region surrounding his house in Zorgvliet. From 1692 to 1699 Borchaert Voet was a member of the Confrérie Pictura in The Hague after which he moved to Dordrecht to spend there the rest of his life. Besides his still life paintings, he also drew some delicate drawings in watercolour of insects such as this marvellous signed sheet 'Manakin', a Surinamese bird Pipra Aureola' in the collection of the Rijksprentenkabinet (inv. RP-T-1900-A-4483). Also the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Quimper, the Kurpfälzisches Museum in Heidelberg, and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London hold some of his paintings in their collections. A variant to this composition signed and painted on panel, (65 x 52.5 cm), was recorded in 1960 in the Art museum The Hague (cf. Walther Bernt, Die Niederländischen Maler des 17. Jahrhunderts, deel 4 (1962), nr. 295). We are grateful to Fred G. Meijer for confirming the attribution to Borchaert Voet on the basis of high-resolution photographs. 64.5 x 52 cm (78.5 x 66 cm) Lit.: Sam Segal & Klara Alen, Dutch and Flemish Flower Pieces, Leiden-Boston, 2020, part II, pp. 833-835 (information on the artist)