Trompe l'Oeil Still-Life

The trompe l’oeil tradition was a very popular form of still life painting during the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, particularly in the Netherlands, Northern Italy and France. Weapons, musical instruments, tools and other possessions hanging on walls, often suspended from nails or hooks, developed into a favourite and enduring trompe l’oeil theme throughout Northern Europe. It is this theme which we see in the present painting which is a trompe l’oeil still-life of a print (after David Teniers), a letter, a pamphlet, a playing card, a quill pen, scissors and a key, all tacked to a wooden board.