Still Life

There is little documentary evidence about the life and work of Maerten Boelema, a deaf-mute, known by his nickname – “de Stomme”–the dumb. He was born in Leeuwarden, in Friesland. Nothing is known of his early artistic training before 1642 when he became a member of the Guild of St. Luke in Haarlem, as a pupil of the still life painter, Willem Claeszoon Heda. By that date, Heda was a successful artist at the height of his powers who was also influential in the Guild. Maerten Boelema de Stomme’s work belongs to the tradition of the so-called monochromatic style of still life painting, developed by Pieter Claeszoon and Willem Claeszoon Heda in Haarlem in the 1630s and 1640s. During this period they concentrated on breakfast and banquet pieces, characterized by a simple and harmonious arrangement of objects on a tabletop, painted in a limited range of colour and tone.