A Woman Feeding a Parrot, with a Page

By 1666 the Dutch Republic was the richest trading nation in Europe, and its merchants wanted pictures that showed off both their money and the painter's patience. Netscher gives them both. His young woman leans out of a painted stone niche, offering food to an African grey parrot, a bird shipped in from West Africa, costly and fashionable. A boy waits in the shadow behind her with a silver tray. Everything is a small performance of wealth, down to the thick oriental carpet draped over the ledge, so heavy it half-covers a row of Roman numerals carved into the stone. Netscher worked in the fijnschilder manner, the fine painting prized in Leiden, where a satin sleeve could take days. Her sidelong glance is aimed straight out at whoever has stopped to look.