Still Life with Grapes

This 1660 grape still life in the Hood Museum of Art at Dartmouth represents de Heem's continued productivity well into his career's later phase, his technical abilities undiminished after three decades of still-life painting. Grapes were among his most frequently painted subjects precisely because their translucent skins, varying colorations, and clustered forms offered ideal conditions for demonstrating optical glazing technique. The Hood Museum's holding of this work reflects the systematic acquisition of Dutch Golden Age paintings by American institutions throughout the twentieth century, when these works were recognized as among the highest achievements of European realist painting. Late de Heem grapes show the accumulated confidence of a painter who has solved every technical problem the subject presents and can now deploy the solution with apparently effortless ease.

De Heem's grape clusters are built through a systematic glazing process: a mid-tone ground, followed by darker shadow glazes on the lower portions of each grape, topped by a warm transparent highlight layer, and finally by a fine white impasto point of primary reflection on the uppermost surface. This four-stage approach gives each grape convincing three-dimensional form and the sense of light penetrating the translucent skin.