Stadel Museum shows "The Magic of Things" ~ Still Life Painting 1500-1800

Written by Karla Cropper Wednesday, 23 February 2011 23:06

 

Frankfurt, Germany - Assembling the superb holdings of the Städel Museum, the Hessisches Landesmuseum Darmstadt, and the Kunstmuseum Basel, the exhibition unfolds a spectrum of still life painting in the Netherlands and Germany from the late fifteenth to the late eighteenth centuries with more than ninety masterpieces by Jan Brueghel the Elder, Jan Davidsz. de Heem, Willem Kalf, Rachel Ruysch, Abraham Mignon, Georg Flegel, Jan Soreau, Gottfried von Wedigh, and Sebastian Stosskopf. This offers a panorama of the genre’s different varieties from prosaic pieces of the early seventeenth century to later works depicting things of splendor, from banquet still lifes to sumptuous bouquets and picturesque animal still lifes.

Dewdrops on dainty petals, light glancing off precious silverware, candied confectionery in blue and white Chinese porcelain bowls, the soft plumage of a dead songbird, the pale hue of a skull – still lifes have not ceased to exercise their spell upon us to this day with their close-up views of inanimate, yet by no means lifeless objects reproduced with painterly finesse. However, still life painting was anything but a merely aesthetic affair, even if today’s viewer tends to perceive it as such. It reflects not only a feeling of transitoriness and a longing for redemption, but also the pleasure of visually representing exotic trading goods with which Dutch and other merchants made their fortunes.

The exhibition “The Magic of Things. Still Life Painting 1500–1800” is sponsored jointly by Sparkassen-Kulturfonds des Deutschen Sparkassen- und Giroverbandes and DekaBank Deutsche Girozentrale.

Since its emancipation from the religious painting of the late Middle Ages, when objects mainly served as symbols or attributes, still lifes initially provided a means of understanding and interpreting things from the viewer’s everyday world that were “lying still.” These objects reflected the order and structure of the Baroque era’s superior abstract world: the human senses or a certain temperament, the elements or the seasons informing the individual’s world, or transitoriness and guilty mankind’s need of redemption.

Yet, both the painters’ and the collectors’ and clients’ economic reality and its specifics also manifested itself in the still lifes as early as in the seventeenth century. The same merchant princes and investors who, primarily in the Netherlands, strove to make their country the most powerful trading nation of the globe, importing exotic goods into Europe from all over the world, ordered still lifes for decorating their town palaces and country houses with pictures revealing the sources of their wealth such as foreign spices, Venetian glass, and Chinese porcelain.

The exhibition, structured to provide the visitor with a survey outlining the development of the genre between 1500 and 1800 and to convey an idea of the most important subjects and varieties of still life painting, commences with early still life forms from the dawn of the modern age. The first section illustrates the process of the still life’s emancipation from a symbolically charged accessory of religious painting to a subject in its own right. The following chapter dedicated to the early autonomous still life around 1600 with Jan Brueghel and Georg Flegel as main representatives marks a first highlight of the exhibition thanks to the selection of particularly fabulous works on display. The next group comprises banquet and vanitas still lifes introducing the visitor to the symbolism of Baroque imagery and its very peculiar oscillations between sensual appeal and admonitions about the transitoriness of worldly existence. The vanitas, the vanity and futility, of all things becomes visible in distinctive symbols, such as a skull, a candle going out, or a clock symbolizing the passage of time.

The following sections presenting fish and hunting still lifes as well as cartouche pictures convey the seventeenth-century painters’ extreme specialization in certain varieties, which offered them strategic advantages on the art market as monopolists in a certain field in their town. These still lifes represented primarily by a larger number of works by Jan Davidsz. de Heem and Willem van Aelst are not only aimed at a display of splendor but also demonstrate the artists’ painterly virtuosity in minute details.

Artists: Willem van Aelst, Pieter Aertsen, Abraham van Beyeren, Peter Binoit, Jan Brueghel d. Ä., Jan Brueghel d. J., Jean Siméon Chardin, Adriaen Coorte, Georg Flegel, Jan Fyt, Willem Claesz. Heda, Jan Davidsz. de Heem, Cornelis de Heem, David Cornelisz. de Heem, Hans Holbein d. J., Jacob van Hulsdonck, Justus Juncker, Jan van Kessel, Jacob Marrel, Abraham Mignon, Pieter de Ring, Ludger tom Ring d. J., Rachel Ruysch, Isaak Soreau, Peter Soreau, Harmen Steenwijck, Sebastian Stoskopff, Jan van de Velde, Jacob van Walscapelle, Gottfried von Wedig, Jan Weenix, a.o.

The exhibition “The Magic of Things” has been prepared by the Städel Museum and the Kunstmuseum Basel in cooperation with the Hessisches Landesmuseum Darmstadt. After its presentation in the Städel, it will be shown in the Kunstmuseum Basel from 5 September 2008 to 4 January 2009.

Catalog: “The Magic of Things. Still Life Painting 1500-1800”, ed. by Jochen Sander. With a foreword by Max Hollein, an introduction by Jochen Sander.

Städel Museum - Schaumainkai 63 - 60596 Frankfurt, Germany - Opening hours: Tuesday, Friday to Sunday 10 am – 6 pm; Wednesday and Thursday 10 am – 9 pm Information: www.staedelmuseum.de , E-Mail: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it , Tel. : +49(0)69-60 50 98-0

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