A human skull, a large bone, books, papers, and a snuffed out, smoking candle are arranged on a marble tabletop near an open window in a darkened room in this vertical still life painting. The color palette is dominated by muted gray, slate blue, ivory white, and tawny brown. Near the bottom center of the composition, the skull faces our left in profile and rests on two small, leather-bound books and papers with illegible black printing. The large bone, a thighbone, is propped up behind the skull on a taller book at the back of the skull. More books, papers, and a box are piled to the right.…
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Vanitas Still Life

François van Daellen (active c. 1636 - c. 1651)

c. 1650

Medium
oil on paper laid down on panel
Classification
Painting
Dimensions
overall: 20.3 × 16.5 cm (8 × 6 1/2 in.)
Museum
National Gallery of Art, CNE-B
Credit line
Nell and Robert Weidenhammer Fund
Rights
Public domain (NGA Open Access, CC0), as the museum states it.
Who can see it
Teens profiles and older: its subject is for older viewers (war, death, the Passion, drink or the like). How works are placed

View at the National Gallery of Art