Lot 26
"Still Life with a Basket of Flowers and Dead Game Birds", Anonymous
Works of Art, Antiquities & Ancient Art | A109kua | Live auction | 1188 Lots
Description
Oil on canvas, lined. Against a dark ground, a shallow basket to the left with roses, tulips, carnations and small white blooms; on the ledge before it single cut flowers. To the right a group of birds suspended head down on cords; below them two falling feathers. The forms in the upper left of the composition not identifiable. The original tacking edges brittle. Age craquelure throughout the paint layer, close-meshed in the dark ground. A reddish-brown ground visible within the cracks. Open, darkened cracks to the paint layer in the area of the pale blooms of the basket, left middle distance. Varnish glossy and unevenly applied. Retouching and overpaint, absorbing under ultraviolet light, in all four quadrants — in strokes and broader passages to the ground in the upper left quadrant, in the ground above and between the group of birds in the upper right quadrant, in a concentration of small spots to the right of centre in the lower part of the composition, and scattered along the left edge. The frame with losses to the polychromy of the mouldings and ornamental strips, the upper right mitre open, a crack to the hollow. Canvas 57.5 x 88.3 cm, frame 72 x 103.5 cm.351840
Condition: III Questions about the lot?
