Clara Peeters, one of the few women artists known from the seventeenth century, displayed an almost modern interest in the play of the geometric forms, light reflections, and texture of objects against a dark background: a stack of cheeses surmounted by a plate of butter shavings, a tall, silver salt cellar, a bread roll, and a bisected artichoke on a pewter plate with cherries. The cherry pit and slice of artichoke suggest someone is present.
