Rachel Ruysch, Vase with Flowers, 1700. Oil on canvas, 75.5 x 60.2 cm. Mauritshuis, Netherlands.

This bouquet is past its best. The flowers are drooping and starting to fade. In the middle, a wilted opium poppy has been cut off. The empty space left there lends depth to the bouquet. Rachel Ruysch specialised in this sort of profuse flower still-life. She inherited her love of flowers and plants from her father, the renowned Amsterdam botanist Frederik Ruysch. Rachel had an international career as a painter and worked until a ripe old age.