Concept and Context:

Vanitas paining were especially popular in the 16th/17th century and started in the Netherlands and the term originally came from the opening lines of the Book of Ecclesiastes in the Bible: ‘Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities, all is vanity’. Vanitas paintings would usually feature skulls, glasses, and candles to show the certainty and inevitability of death, and the transience of life.

Visual Analysis:

This painting by Pieter Claesz shows the our own mortality in several different ways, using different objects to reference elements regarding death. Firstly and most obviously is the human skull which is the main subject of this painting. It represents not only death, but how everyone is the same when they die, and it does not matter your beliefs, appearance or actions because underneath that we are all the same. Also notably is the glass resting against the skull. This once again references death, and given that it is next to the skull, it can be used to represent the life of person who died and is now just a skull, as the glass has tipped over, and there is no more liquid left, this shows how the person has run out of life, and judging from how it looks like it has been knocked over, it would be possible to assume that Claesz may have done this to show that the person died a quick death.

Another object commonly featured in Vanitas paintings is an hourglass to show the unchangeable nature of time, and how there is no stopping it. Whilst this painting features no hourglass, it features a cigarette to create the same effect, showing that we all eventually get burnt out into nothing. The use of the quill has a similar effect as well, and because as there is no inkwell, the ink on the quill represents our lives, and how every day it is used up bit by bit until we eventually run out and can no longer function and then die, which is represented by the quill running out of ink.

The Books under the skull also have a very significant meaning. They represent all of the knowledge that this person had learned in their lifetime. This helps us connect with the person, as it gives them a backstory of sorts. Schooling was obviously much harder to come by in the 16th century, and was mainly reserved for the rich and powerful. This therefore means that the skull belonged to a wealthy scholar, perhaps a writer due to the quill, giving the object a double meaning