Study of a Tulip (Wit en root boode)
Medium
Point of brush and transparent and opaque watercolors with traces of graphite and gum glazing on antique laid paper
Dimensions
31.2 × 20.6 cm
Classification
Drawing
Department
Drawings
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Credit
Nancy F. and Joseph P. Keithley Collection Gift
Accession Number
2020.130
Tags
About this artwork
This image of a tulip was made as part of a tulip book used as a grower’s marketing tool during the so-called tulip mania, a speculative bubble in 17th-century Holland, when ten tulip bulbs could cost more than a stately Amsterdam canal house. The striations on the tulip, which were caused by a virus in the bulb, made it especially valuable. Pieter Holsteyn II was one of many artists in the Netherlands at the time who specialized in botanical illustration.This tulip's Dutch name, inscribed on th...