Nature morte à l’aiguière

A silver ewer stands at the centre of a table draped with a white cloth, its polished body catching the reflection of a window as a point of light; beside it a glass of pale wine, a pewter dish of olives and a half-peeled lemon with its curling rind complete a carefully ordered meal. Willem Claesz. Heda was the great master of the Dutch monochrome banketje, the “breakfast piece,” and this panel of 1643 shows his signature restraint: few objects, a limited palette of silver and white against a dark ground, and virtuoso passages of light on metal and glass. The painting is held in the Petit Palais, musée des Beaux-Arts de la Ville de Paris.