Still Life with Flowers in a Greek Vase: Allegory of Spring

In 1817 some of the flowers in this Greek vase were still new arrivals in Europe. Dahlias came from Mexico, where botanists sent the first ones to the royal botanical garden in Madrid in 1789, and the garden hydrangea reached England from China at about the same time, through Joseph Banks at Kew, the botanical garden near London. Georgius van Os set them beside lilies, rhododendrons and roses, in a Greek vase on a marble plinth scattered with shells. Below runs a bronze frieze in which little putti help Venus at her toilet. The canvas is almost one and a half metres tall, a size meant for a grand room, and the painter signed and dated it at the lower right, G.J.J. van Os 1817.