A duel

Two ornately dressed women sit either side of a small red table set with a chessboard and a bronze bowl where two doves perch; a young page watches from the left, while the woman at right, draped in an icon-patterned mantle with large feathered wings, lifts a finger to her lips. Roses, delphiniums and irises bank up around them, with a parrot and a white bird among the blooms.

Saturated jewel tones - teal, crimson, gold and violet - are laid in smooth, detailed strokes with gilded ornament on the fabrics; clear, even light gives every petal and feather crisp definition, and the dense, patterned composition creates a hushed, storybook mood, as if the chess game itself were an allegory.