Catharina du Bois (Dutch, d.1776)
Still Life With Peaches, Plums, And Grapes
Watercolor on paper tipped to a paper mount
Sheet size: 13 3/4 x 10 3/4 in.
Frame size: 20 x 16 1/2 in.
Provenance: Ambassador and Mrs. Joseph Verner Reed 

It is not known where, when, and in what family, Catharina du Bois (also: Poirrier du Bois) was born. The earliest mention of her dates from November 1, 1744, when she married the Pieter Johannes van Cuyck, a painter of good standing in The Hague.

What we know of Catharina du Bois the painter, we know, thanks to Pieter Terwestens Register of Aanteekeninge [...] of Pictura’s art-confrerie room, from 1776. It states that ‘Catharina du Bois, in her time painted, made such a wonderful floral and fruit, that it would have made it a greater rise and name with it, if it continued in it and had not completely abandoned any years before her death” (Terwest, 78).  In the past, she was cataloged as the C. van Cuyck who in 1746, together with Pieter van Cuyck, made the watercolors to illustrate an unprecedented reprint of Promenade de Saint Cloud (1738) by Nicolas Fromaget (these drawings, ‘desiné par PI and C. van Cuyck, peintres à la Haye ‘, are located in the Royal Library, The Hague). According to Terwest, Catharina du Bois died on January 6, 1776. She was taken to the grave of the Van Cuyck family in the clown church: ‘The 12th of January argued at the day Catharini Poirrier du Bois’ (cited by Van der Muelen, 30).

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