Art Institute of Chicago

A Vanitas Still Life with a Flag, Candlestick, Musical Instruments, Books, Writing Paraphernalia, Globes, and Hourglass

Edwaert Collier (Dutch, 1642–1708)

Date

1662

Medium

Oil on canvas

Culture

Holland

Department

Painting and Sculpture of Europe

Institution

Art Institute of Chicago

This ambitious still life conjures the complexities of Dutch colonization and cartography in the 1600s. Casually arranged on a table are a book about seafaring, which includes a map of the Americas copied from a 1660 print; a volume on the history of Holland (Oud Batavia), a clever reference to the Dutch Republic’s new territory in Indonesia (Batavia); and the terrestrial and celestial globes, positioned to show the Pacific Ocean and lands the Dutch had newly reached. While the inscriptions on the globes and the scrap of paper at right are in Latin, the other documents are in Dutch; the Dutch presence is reinforced by the flag in the background. By 1662 the Netherlands had ceded its territory in New Holland (now Brazil) to the Portuguese, and it was also fighting with the British for New Amsterdam (now New York) in North America. The tenuous nature of these conquests is amplified by ephemeral allusions. The extinguished candle, violin with a broken string, pocket watch, and hourglass all represent the biblical passage from Ecclesiastes at far right: Vanitas vanitatum et omnia vanitas (Vanity of vanities, all is vanity). With his striking ability to paint the printed word, Collier raised questions about the permanence of worldly accomplishments and the ambitions of humankind.

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