earlier labels about this work
  • Treasury: A Generous Legacy, 18 December 2015 – 27 November 2016

    The artist for this early Dutch domestic scene is not identified, but it suggests the influence of Gabriel Metsu (1629-1667), a student of Gerrit Dou, whose painting The Physician is also in the Gallery's collection. The scene celebrates the established ideals of seventeenth-century Dutch housekeeping, with ingredients waiting and pans and utensils shining clean; everything carefully prepared and in order.

    This painting entered the collection as a gift (along with twelve engravings by William Hogarth) from the estate of Frederick James Oakley, an English dental surgeon who moved to Christchurch with his wife in 1953 and died here three years later.