Adriaen Coorte

At the beginning of his career Coorte painted various types of still lifes, some animal paintings, and landscapes. He later abandoned these more elaborate compositions to specialise in minimalist small-scale still lifes depicting single objects such as shells, asparagus or apricots, brightly lit against a dark background. Coorte’s ingenious lighting and keen eye for detail resulted in objects that look very lifelike. It is striking that he painted many of his works on paper which he then stuck on wood panels – this technique was very unusual in the 17th century.