Rating and value of paintings by Clara Peeters

If you own a work by or after the artist Clara Peeters, and would like to know its value, our state-approved experts and auctioneers will offer you their appraisal services.

Our specialists will work to carry out a free appraisal of your work, and provide you with an accurate estimate of its value on the current market.

Then, if you wish to sell your work, we'll direct you to the best possible arrangement to obtain the optimum price.

Rating and value of the artist Clara Peeters

Clara Peeters is a well-known artist among portrait lovers. Her visibility on the art market continues to grow, her quotation is exploding and she is increasingly in demand : it is speculated that her works could reach unprecedented amounts at auction.

Women artists of the 17th century, pupils in the workshops of undisputed grand masters, produced works that are extremely sought-after today.

For the latter, her oil on canvas Roses, lilies, an iris and other flowers in a terracotta vase, with a pot of carnations and a butterfly on a rim sold for €1,141,000 in 2022, against an estimate of €1,141,000 to €1,711,000, suggesting further upside potential for the artist's works.

Order of value from a simple work to the most prestigious

Style and technique by artist Clara Peeters   

Clara Peeters (1585 - 1655) was a Dutch artist who produced mainly still lifes, in small format. The genre was still very marginal at the beginning of the artist's career. She excelled in depicting precious objects, refined foods, glassware and metal utensils, often on elaborately laid tables.

Clara Peeters' style contributed to the emergence of " banketje ", the name of the Flemish banquet still life, characterized above all by descriptive rigor.

Her line is renowned for its exceptional finesse, depicting every reflection, water pearl, knife edge or floral detail with near-goldsmith meticulousness. She plays with reflections on metal or glass, sometimes going so far as to insert her own miniature self-portrait in a carafe or tumbler.

Thanks to this process, her signature is discreet yet assertive. The artist's touch is smoothed, invisible, placed at the service of visual illusion.

Lighting often comes from a single lateral source, creating sharp shadows and controlled bursts of light. She brilliantly renders contrasting surfaces such as the moire of fabrics, the shine of pewter or silver objects, the skin of a peeled lemon or cheese.

Her compositions are intended to highlight the interplay of transparency, shine and matter, in a sensual, ordered approach. She often paints bourgeois or aristocratic meals  olives, waffles, wine, exotic fruits, fish and rare spices.

The objects she depicts are arranged with great geometric rigor, often aligned along the edge of the table or placed along gentle diagonals. Her works combine domestic realism with discreet, sometimes moral symbolism (vanities, suggestions of temporality or ephemeral luxury).

At a time when too few women were allowed to paint professionally, she stood out for the technical quality and intellectual subtlety of her works. Clara Peeters thus offered a version of the still life less spectacular than some of her male contemporaries, but more striving for perfection.

Today, she is recognized as one of the founders of the genre in Flanders, and is one of the few 17th-century women artists to sign her works with regularity.

The life of Clara Peeters  

Clara Peeters was born in Antwerp, in the former Spanish Netherlands, which corresponds to present-day Belgium. Almost nothing is known about her family or her training, but she shows impressive technical mastery from an early age, suggesting an apprenticeship with an already established Flemish master.

She may have been trained in a male workshop, but there is no entry in the local guild of Saint-Luc and therefore no confirmation of her official status, which was relatively typical for a woman at the time.

Her first known work is dated 1607, which would indicate that she was already painting at the age of around 13 (according to some sources). This hypothesis is still debated today, but seems to be attested by the signature.

She regularly signed her paintings, often with the words " Clara Peeters fecit ", which also shows an assertion of her authorship in a male-dominated world. She was also one of the first female artists in the Netherlands to have an identifiable career, thanks to her works, most of which are well preserved and dated.

Clara Peeters specialized early on in banquet still lifes, a genre that was booming at the time, and very much linked to Flemish bourgeois prosperity.
She was active mainly between 1607 and 1621. Her activity seems to have been centered in Antwerp, but some works suggest a passage through Amsterdam or Haarlem, where she may have come into contact with Dutch artists.

We don't know whether she was married or not, as no civil status documents confirm her family or domestic relationships. Like many female artists of the period, she disappeared from the archives after 1621, making the second half of her life completely unknown.

Despite this silence, her signed, dated and technically very coherent works point to a sustained professional career, probably in private studios or via her commissions.

Long forgotten by art history, she was rediscovered in the 20th century thanks to research into Flemish painting and women artists. She is now considered one of the pioneers of Flemish still life and a rare figure of female painter in early European modernity.

Later, other figures such as Anne Vallayer Coster or Élizabeth Vigée le Brun in France will in turn lead successful professional careers.

In 2016, the Prado Museum dedicated a monographic exhibition to her, the first dedicated to a woman artist in the museum's history.

Focus on Still Life with Cheese, Artichoke and Cherries, Clara Peeters

Still Life with Cheese, Artichoke and Cherries is an oil on wood panel by Clara Peeters housed at the Prado in Madrid, measuring approximately 34 x 49 cm. The work features a wooden table garnished with victuals, with a slightly bird's-eye view. Notched cheeses, artichokes, cherries, butter, bread, pewter and earthenware vessels can be seen.

The horizontal composition is tight, centered on everyday foods, which are placed with care but without theatrical emphasis. Each object is isolated but integrated into a highly controlled visual rhythm, based on circular shapes (plates, cheese, bowl, basket).

There is no visible human figure, but a very embodied presence of the human hand through cutting, biting and arranging. The details are extremely refined (grain of the bread, moisture of the cherries, softness of the butter, roughness of the artichoke).

There is also a certain contrast between matt (fruit, crumb) and shiny (metal, ceramic) surfaces, which is perfectly mastered. Peeters plays with varied textures and localized lighting effects, without overloading the image.

The light source is lateral, with sharp shadows and precise highlights accentuating the relief. In the lid of a pewter jar, we can make out in miniature a reflection in which the artist has integrated her own portrait (a practice she employs in several of her works).

This creates a relationship between viewer, painter and object, in an intentional play of mirrors. This still life is apparently intended to be humble, but is rich in symbols of fertility, consumption and temporality.

It can also be interpreted as an affirmation of the female painter in the material world, mastering the eye, the hand and the technique. Unlike some contemporary vanitas, the work suggests neither strong moralism nor drama.

This work is also an exemplar of Peeters' mature style, with dense yet legible composition, realistic rendering, discreet refinement and the signature of her talent.

It combines technical virtuosity, apparent humility of subject and silent self-affirmation, which is the hallmark of this artist long erased by history.

Recognizing the artist's signature

Clara Peeters does not necessarily sign her works. Copies may exist, which is why expertise remains important.

Knowing the value of a work

If you happen to own a work by Clara Peeters or after the artist, don't hesitate to request a free valuation using our form on our website.

A member of our team of experts and licensed auctioneers will contact you promptly to provide you with an estimate of the market value of your work, as well as ad hoc information about it.

If you are considering selling your work, you will also be accompanied by our specialists in order to benefit from alternatives for selling it at the best possible price, taking into account the inclinations of the market.