This still life with a plate of fruits and a bee on the marble board was executed around 1820s-1830s by listed Austrian portrait and still life painter Franz Xaver Hoffmann, who lived in Vienna and Munich  and had exhibitions in the k. k. Academy of Fine Arts at St. Anna in Vienna with  genre paintings, portraits and fruit pieces in 1834, 1835, 1836 and 1840, as: 1834 “The Undecided” and “Portrait of the Composer Joachim Hoffmann” [s. d. No. 16]; in 1835 “A Winemaker” and 2 portraits; in 1836 “A Wounded Knight” and in 1840 “A Piece of Fruit”. After this time, no works by his hand were shown in exhibitions, nor was anything else known about his artistic activity. 

Literature: artist Lexicons: by Thieme/Becker; Prof.H.Fuchs (both in German); in on-line: Wikisource.

Inscription: signed and titled : F.X.Hoffmann, München,  lower right.

Technique: oil on canvas, gilded frame of 19th century.

Measurements:  unframed w 16 1/8" x h 11 3/4"(41 x 30 cm), framed 24" x 19 2/3"( 61 x 50 cm).

Condition:  very good.