AUGUST WILHELM SIEVERT (ATTRIBUTED)

STILL LIFE WITH GAME, LETTUCE AND VEGETABLES

Oil on canvas
51.5 × 41 cm / 20.3 × 16.1 in
with frame: 63 × 53 cm / 24.8 × 20.8 in

PROVENANCE: European private collection.

This rare still life attributed to August Wilhelm Sievert — best known for his floral compositions — shows the artist turning to an unusual subject: vegetables and game. The lettuce, mallard and vegetables are presented with the same botanical clarity that characterises his flower pieces, each object rendered openly and distinctly, almost as if intended for a natural history study. This direct, slightly naïve manner is precisely what makes Sievert’s paintings so appealing, giving the composition an honest, northern character and a strong decorative presence.

Despite the thick, yellowed varnish, the work retains a refined painterly harmony reminiscent of seventeenth-century German still-life painters such as Christopher Paudiss, whose restrained palettes and calm compositions shaped the tradition Sievert inherited. The soft transitions, intimate scale and quiet atmosphere give this still life an unmistakably Central European sensibility — a beautiful and evocative example of a rarely encountered subject within Sievert’s oeuvre.