Twee tulpen met waterjuffer en vlinder 1637

Jacob Marrel created this watercolor and gouache painting of two tulips with a dragonfly and butterfly. Marrel was a German-born painter who spent much of his career in the Netherlands during the height of "Tulip Mania." This was a period in the 17th century when contract prices for bulbs of the recently introduced and fashionable tulip reached extraordinarily high levels and then dramatically collapsed. Paintings such as this one were not merely decorative, they served as a kind of catalog of the most desirable specimens. Note how the tulips are identified by name, almost like portraits of individuals. Flowers in general, and the tulip in particular, came to symbolize wealth, status, and the transience of life's pleasures. Historians consult archival records, price lists, and botanical treatises to understand the economic, social, and cultural significance of these images. The value of art, like that of tulips, is always subject to the changing winds of fashion and the market.