Strawberries & Cherries

" Strawberries and Cherries " Stone Coaster dimensions: 3.875 " x 3.875 " Artist: Margaretta Angelica Peale (1795-1882) Date: ca. 1813-1830   Like her father James, who trained her, and her uncle, sisters, and cousins, Margaretta Peale joined "the family business" of art-making. She most likely began her career in 1813 and exhibited still lifes in the Academy annuals of the 1820s. Although Peale was reluctant to call herself a professional artist, this charming still life nevertheless testifies to Peale's skill. Against a neutral background, the artist isolated a porcelain bowl of ripe berries, flanked by a cluster of cherries. Lit from the left, the simple, yet effective composition juxtaposes the warm reds and yellows of the strawberries and cherries with the cool olive and gray background and shelf. While obviously influenced by her father, whose works she occasionally copied, as well as by her first cousin Raphaelle, the first exhibiting painter of still lifes in the United Sta