Status on Canvas

Still lifes also worked as status symbols. Paintings of rare tulips, exotic shells, Chinese porcelain, and imported lemons showed that the owner could afford luxury goods from global trade. A single canvas could gather objects from across the world — quiet proof of the Dutch Republic's commercial power.

Flower painting became a specialty in its own right, and some of its biggest names were women. Rachel Ruysch and Maria van Oosterwijck built international reputations, sold to royal collectors, and out-earned many male painters of their day in a market that prized their precise, lifelike bouquets.