Mathias Withoos (Amersfoort 1627 – Hoorn 1703),, A Forest Still Life with an Otter and Two Fish. Oil on unlined canvas, 45.72 x 53.34 cm. © Lawrence Steigrad Fine Arts

NEW YORK, NY.- Mathias Withoos (1627–1703) was a Dutch painter known for his richly detailed still lifes, often overflowing with exotic plants, insects, and small creatures. Born in Amersfoort, he studied under Jacob van Campen before joining the Bentvueghels, a lively group of Dutch artists who made a name for themselves in Italy.

Withoos had a particular gift for painting sottobosco — lush, forest floor scenes teeming with life. His works, often a little eerie or mysterious, blended scientific curiosity with Baroque drama — a perfect match for King Charles’s return to the throne after a decade of the Commonwealth and the era’s fascination with the strange and wonderful sides of nature. Collectors with a taste for rarities, curiosities, and the exotic — like King Charles II of England — would have found his style appealing.

During the Restoration (after 1660), Charles II’s taste in painting was shaped by his years of exile in France and the Dutch Republic. He absorbed the best of continental art — the realism and fine detail of the Dutch and Flemish masters, the grand classical works of the Italians — and mixed them into a style that blended sophistication with an eager curiosity about the natural world.

Thanks to his keen interest in natural history (and perhaps some smart advisors), paintings like Withoos’s weren’t just decoration — they were conversation starters. They fit into a court culture that prized learning, collecting, and, of course, showing off a bit.

At least two paintings by Mathias Withoos made their way into Charles II’s collection in the 1660s, recorded in the royal inventories. One of them was described as "a landscape wherein are thistles, & flowers, an otter, and two fishes" — believed to be our painting illustrated here.

The scene — an otter, victorious over two dead fish — might not just have been admired for its realism. In a court where symbolism mattered, it could have been read as a political allegory: a metaphor for power, dominance, or even the monarchy devouring the remnants of rebellion. (A bit of a stretch, maybe, but exactly the kind of layered meaning that Restoration audiences loved.)

Mathias Withoos wasn’t a court painter or a figure in high political circles, so it's unlikely Charles II ever met him personally. But thanks to his association with the Bentvueghels and his growing reputation, Withoos had enough international recognition to catch the eye of collectors across Europe. The fact that his name appears in royal inventories suggests he was considered fashionable — and intellectually interesting enough for Charles’s eclectic and ambitious collection. Even if Withoos and Charles II never met, their worlds seemed to have matched perfectly in the fantastic details of a painting like this one.

Two Withoos paintings of the Royal Collection :

Matthias Withoos (circa 1627–1703), Flowers with Insects, 1665. Oil on canvas, 109.2 x 104.1 cm, signed and dated 'MWithoos Amervoort Ao 1665'. Royal Collection, RCIN 404578. Royal Collection Trust/© His Majesty King Charles III 2025

In 1648 Withoos went to Italy with Otto Marseus van Schrieck (see CW 182, 405621) and worked for Cardinal Leopold de Medici. This work dates from after his return to Amersfoort in 1653. Flower painting was an important and profitable speciality in Holland throughout the seventeenth century. For the first half of the century artists not surprisingly concentrated on the beauty of the blooms, with an occasional frisson of ugliness provided by an insect or lizard. After 1650 two artists - Otto Marseus van Schrieck and Mathias Withoos, later joined by Rachel Ruysch (1660-1750) - experimented with the idea of switching this balance in scenes sometimes known as 'forest floor still lives'. These are made up of thistles, thorns, mosses, broken branches, coarse grasses and peopled with lizards, snakes and insects, with the occasional butterfly by way of contrast. These images remind us that painting has the power to disgust and terrify, as well as to delight. It also suggests that Beauty has a sort of 'anti-beauty' as its shadow, an idea found generally at this period, especially in Italy. Salvator Rosa refers for example in a letter of 1662 to the 'terrible beauty' ('orrida bellezza') of a mountain pass. A century later the phenonemon was called the 'picturesque' and defined in many often contradictory ways. This painting is interesting because it is not just obviously 'creepy'; it keeps delight and disgust in a delicate balance, within the context of a dark and threatening forest floor. The hedgehog is the best expression of the dark, spiky and sharp aspect of nature (supported by some thorns and thistles), to be contrasted with the smooth, soft and brightly colour quality of a flower's petal. Inscribed: 'MWithoos / Amersvoort Ao 1665'. First recorded in the collection of Charles II.

Matthias Withoos (circa 1627–1703), Still Life of Flowers with a Watch and Skull, between circa 1650 and circa 1670. Oil on canvas, 47.7 x 38.9 cm, signed and dated 'MWithoos Amervoort Ao 1665'. Royal Collection, RCIN 405622. Royal Collection Trust/© His Majesty King Charles III 2025