(Vienna 1791–1866)
Still Life with Grapes, Peaches and Walnuts, signed, dated Franz Xav: Petter.1823., oil on panel, 45 x 60 cm, two horizontal continuous (restored) fissures, framed

Provenance:
Private Collection Vienna;
Acquired in 1978.

Flower painting experienced a real boom in Vienna in the first half of the 19th century. Flowers were in fashion, as the subjects of botanical research, gardening or as still lifes. A fashion for floral still lifes was prevalent, emerging from the Imperial & Royal Viennese Porcelain Factory, which needed and trained skilled flower painters for the decoration of its pieces. At the Viennese Academy, a separate flower drawing school was founded under the direction of Johann Baptist Drechsler and later continued by Sebastian Wegmayr. The focus was on the further development of flower and fruit bouquets in the Netherlandish style of the 17th and 18th centuries.
Franz Xaver Petter, who studied at the Academy with Drechsler and Wegmayr and created a large oeuvre of still lifes until the middle of the 19th century, is also part of this tradition. The present lot is a typical example of his balanced compositions. On a simple marble base stands a wicker basket that looks like something collected from a walk through a vineyard: grapes in all shades, white peaches and fresh walnuts bring together the smells of September days, marking the changing seasons from summer to autumn.