Artwork
Still Life
Still Life is an oil painting by the Flemish Baroque painting artist Frans Snyders. It dates from 1628 and is held in the collection of the Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp.
About this work
Subject & Meaning
The painting presents a banquet of perishable abundance, arranging fruit, game, and vegetables to signify the fleeting nature of material prosperity.
The painting presents a banquet of perishable abundance, arranging fruit, game, and vegetables to signify the fleeting nature of material prosperity. A solitary cookie rests among the spoils, underscoring themes of transience and moral warning within the vanitas tradition. Rendered in oil on canvas, the work measures 117.5 cm by 150.1 cm and resides in the collection of the Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp.
Technique & Style
The work is executed in oil paint on canvas, a standard support for seventeenth-century Flemish still-life production. Its physical dimensions are 117.5 cm in height by 150.1 cm in width, giving it a horizontal orientation suited to the broad arrangement of fruit, game, vegetables, and cookies it depicts.
Stylistically, the painting belongs to the still-life genre and is classified as a painting within the Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp collection. The combination of game and produce within a single composition is characteristic of the abundant market and larder scenes associated with Frans Snyders's practice.
History & Provenance
Still Life is an oil painting on canvas attributed to Frans Snyders, housed in the Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp. The work measures 117.5 cm in height and 150.1 cm in width. It was created as part of the museum's collection and reflects the artist's specialization in the still life genre, depicting fruit, game, vegetables, and a cookie.
Its placement within the museum's holdings underscores its significance in the historical development of Flemish still life painting.
Still Life by Frans Snyders is part of the collection of the Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp, where it is catalogued under the accession number KMSKA 5082. The work has been exhibited in various presentations of the museum's still-life holdings, including a 2018 overview of Flemish Baroque paintings at the same institution.
Overview
Created around 1628, this oil painting by Flemish artist Frans Snyders presents a meticulously arranged still life. The composition rests on a white‑clothed table and gathers a range of everyday items, dead game, a bowl of fruit, a basket of vegetables, a plate of cookies, and a vase of flowers, rendered with careful observation.
Context
During the early Baroque period, Flemish painters like Snyders responded to a growing market for decorative still lifes that displayed wealth and culinary bounty. This piece reflects that demand, combining realistic detail with a theatrical arrangement that would have appealed to affluent patrons seeking both visual pleasure and moral reflection.
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Artist & collection
Artist
Frans Snyders or Frans Snijders was a Flemish painter of animals, hunting scenes, market scenes, and still lifes.
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