VASE, PARROT, AND ARTIST'S PALETTE, signed J.B. Ord and dated 1841, l.r.; oil on canvas; 40 x 50 inches NOTE: The second quarter of the nineteenth century was a period of relative inactivity for American still life painting. The deaths of Raphaelle and James Peale left a void, though in 1840 Joseph Biays Ord began to show significant paintings which carried on the great Philadelphia tradition of still life painting. In their book, American Still Life Painting (Praeger Publishers, N.Y., 1971), William Gerdts and Russel Burke discuss Still Life with Parrot and Vase (plate 5-3) as being '...Ord at his most sensual... Ord uses a Chinese vase that probably had connotations of exoticism during his period. Among the other objects featured in Ord's painting are a parrot, an interesting choice in light of the fact that his father was the noted ornithologist who completed Alexander Wilson's American Ornithology Fruits of great variety and of a distinctly American caste are piled on the table; a large broken watermelon share the center of interest with the Chinese vase. Pineapples, crabappples, figs and grapes lie in profusion, currants pour from a cornucopia-like pottery jug, and the whole is embraced by a grape arbor. The artist's palette occupies a position of prominence in the foreground. Here, symbolically, is the 'artist amidst his subjects.'.