Still-Life

1642 · Private collection

still-life

The painting depicts a still-life with a stoneware jug, a flute, a roemer, shrimps, bread and tobacco on pewter plates, shrimps in a wan-li porcelain bowl, together with a knife, all on a draped table with a white tablecloth. It is signed centre left: M. B.

About the Artist

Maerten Boelema De Stomme

1611 – 1664

Flemish painter of still-lifes. Born in Leeuwarden in 1611, Maerten (or Martinus) was a deaf-mute (hence his byname 'De Stomme'), who was recorded in Haarlem in 1642 where he was accepted as a pupil of Willem Claesz. Heda. He must have been a trained painter before he came to work in Heda's studio in 1642. Boelema's dated works only span a two-year period, from 1642 until 1644. There are about twenty signed still-lifes known by the artist.

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