Vase of flowers and a basin

Dolci painted almost nothing but saints and prayer, so this is the odd one out, the only important still life he is known to have made. Cardinal Giovan Carlo de' Medici commissioned it in May 1662 and paid 60 scudi, a sum thought outrageous at the time for a picture of flowers, justified only by the sheer finish. Every bloom is a real, identifiable variety, caught at the moment of opening. In a white porcelain bowl to the left sit three tulips prized by collectors, and at the edge of the shadow a single tulip has already gone limp, the one flower past its best in an arrangement where everything else is still fresh.