Baroque
The Baroque (, ; ) is a style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th century until the 1750s. In the territories of the Spanish and Portuguese empires including t ...
allegorical
As a literary device or artistic form, an allegory is a narrative or visual representation in which a character, place, or event can be interpreted to represent a hidden meaning with moral or political significance. Authors have used allegory th ...
Sebastian Stoskopff
Sebastian (or Sébastien) Stoskopff (July 13, 1597 – February 10, 1657) was an Alsatian painter. He is considered one of the most important German still life painters of his time. His works, which were rediscovered after 1930, portray gobl ...
. It is on display in the
Musée de l'Œuvre Notre-Dame
The Musée de l'Œuvre Notre-Dame (or Frauenhausmuseum in German) is the city of Strasbourg's museum for Upper Rhenish fine arts and decorative arts, dating from the early Middle Ages until 1681. The museum is famous for its collection of orig ...
. Its inventory number is MBA 1249 ("MBA" stands for '' Musée des Beaux-Arts'').
The painting is the last, largest, and most ambitious of Stoskopff's
vanitas
A ''vanitas'' (Latin for 'vanity') is a symbolic work of art showing the transience of life, the futility of pleasure, and the certainty of death, often contrasting symbols of wealth and symbols of ephemerality and death. Best-known are ''van ...
still-life
A still life (plural: still lifes) is a work of art depicting mostly inanimate subject matter, typically commonplace objects which are either natural (food, flowers, dead animals, plants, rocks, shells, etc.) or man-made (drinking glasses, boo ...
s, and the sum of his painterly achievements at this point in his career (Stoskopff had just settled again in his hometown of
Strasbourg
Strasbourg (, , ; german: Straßburg ; gsw, label=Bas Rhin Alsatian, Strossburi , gsw, label=Haut Rhin Alsatian, Strossburig ) is the prefecture and largest city of the Grand Est region of eastern France and the official seat of the Eu ...
, after many years in
Paris
Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...
). Among the multiple
symbol
A symbol is a mark, sign, or word that indicates, signifies, or is understood as representing an idea, object, or relationship. Symbols allow people to go beyond what is known or seen by creating linkages between otherwise very different conc ...
ic elements of its
iconography
Iconography, as a branch of art history, studies the identification, description and interpretation of the content of images: the subjects depicted, the particular compositions and details used to do so, and other elements that are distinct fro ...
relating to the frailty of existence and
death
Death is the irreversible cessation of all biological functions that sustain an organism. For organisms with a brain, death can also be defined as the irreversible cessation of functioning of the whole brain, including brainstem, and brain ...
, it quotes an
engraving
Engraving is the practice of incising a design onto a hard, usually flat surface by cutting grooves into it with a Burin (engraving), burin. The result may be a decorated object in itself, as when silver, gold, steel, or Glass engraving, glass ...
by
Jacques Callot
Jacques Callot (; – 1635) was a baroque printmaker and draftsman from the Duchy of Lorraine (an independent state on the north-eastern border of France, southwestern border of Germany and overlapping the southern Netherlands). He is an impo ...
, depicting a
jester
A jester, court jester, fool or joker was a member of the household of a nobleman or a monarch employed to entertain guests during the medieval and Renaissance eras. Jesters were also itinerant performers who entertained common folk at fairs and ...
. The three elaborate
hanap
A hanap is an obsolete, Norman-French term for a large drinking goblet, made of precious material such as gold or silver, and used especially on state occasions.
In Literature
1. Old London Silver, Its History, Its Makers and Its Marks by Montagu ...
s in the upper left edge of the painting are faithful depictions of works by Stoskopff's brother-in-law Nicolas Riedinger, a master
goldsmith
A goldsmith is a Metalworking, metalworker who specializes in working with gold and other precious metals. Nowadays they mainly specialize in jewelry-making but historically, goldsmiths have also made cutlery, silverware, platter (dishware), pl ...
in Strasbourg since 1609. The whole
composition
Composition or Compositions may refer to:
Arts and literature
*Composition (dance), practice and teaching of choreography
*Composition (language), in literature and rhetoric, producing a work in spoken tradition and written discourse, to include v ...
consciously repeats Stoskopff's slightly morbid ''Kitchen Still Life with a Calf's Head'' from 1640 (see below), which had already been a ''
Memento mori
''Memento mori'' (Latin for 'remember that you ave todie'
A
poem
Poetry (derived from the Greek ''poiesis'', "making"), also called verse, is a form of literature that uses aesthetic and often rhythmic qualities of language − such as phonaesthetics, sound symbolism, and metre − to evoke meanings in ...
in
German
German(s) may refer to:
* Germany (of or related to)
**Germania (historical use)
* Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language
** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law
**Ger ...
written with chalk on a board hanging from the left side of the table reveals the meaning of the painting:
''Kunst, Reichtum, Macht und Kühnheit stirbet'' ''Die Welt und all ihr Tun verdirbet'' ''Ein Ewiges kommt nach dieser Zeit'' ''Ihr Toren, flieht die Eitelkeit''.
(Art, Wealth, Power and Audacity die The World and all its Doing perish Eternity arrives once this Time is over Fools that you are, run away from Vanity)
Sebastian-Stoskopff-Stillleben-mit-Kalbskopf.jpg, ''Kitchen Still Life with a Calf's Head'' (
Saarland Museum
The Saarland Museum is an art museum in Saarbrücken, Saarland, Germany. It is spread across three sites, each with a different specialism.
Museum in the Palace Church
The Museum in the Palace Church (''Museum in der Schlosskirche'') special ...
Saarbrücken
Saarbrücken (; french: link=no, Sarrebruck ; Rhine Franconian: ''Saarbrigge'' ; lb, Saarbrécken ; lat, Saravipons, lit=The Bridge(s) across the Saar river) is the capital and largest city of the state of Saarland, Germany. Saarbrücken is S ...