Breakfast Still Life

Willem Claesz. Heda’s still life may look like a snapshot of an abandoned meal, but the scene is carefully arranged, revealing the artist’s ability to create complex but harmonious compositions. Heda used the pewter chargers as horizontal elements in the foreground and the glass vessels and salt-cellar as verticals in the background, with the overturned ewer positioned diagonally to connect the two planes. Faint creases in the tablecloth, plates hanging precariously off the table’s edge, and the window reflected on the pitcher’s surface demonstrate the artist’s observant eye as well as his virtuosity in handling paint. Executed in a limited palette of silvers, grays, and browns, this work is an example of the “tonal trend” in Dutch 17th-century painting.