Roses and an iris in a glass vase, crabs and prawns on a pewter platter, a Façon-de-Venise wineglass, a stoneware ewer, a bunch of grapes, a bread roll and a roemer on a partly-draped table

The son of the composer Emanuel Adriaenssen and brother of the artists Vincent and Nicolaes Adriaenssen, Alexander was apprenticed in 1597 to Artus van Laeck, becoming a master in the Antwerp painters' guild in 1610. Adriaenssen's oeuvre consists entirely of still lifes, mainly of food on tables with copper- and tinware, glass and pottery (for example the Still life with Fish of 1660 in the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam). Much rarer are his flower still lifes, consisting of five works depicting single vases and a small group (including the present picture and those in the Hermitage, St. Petersburg, and the Museum voor Schone Kunsten, Ghent) that include such an element within a larger composition. Another such work, with which this picture is closely comparable, was sold in these Rooms, 2 December 1949, lot 118 (see Spiessens, op. cit., p. 126, no. 43, fig. 28).