A still life is a painting, drawing or print depicting inanimate objects arranged by the artist, such as flowers, fruit, food, game, vessels, books, musical instruments or tableware. The genre allows the artist to explore form, light, texture and colour, and it often carries symbolic meanings beyond the simple description of the objects shown.
Still life emerged as an independent genre in Europe around the end of the sixteenth century and flourished in the Netherlands during the Dutch Golden Age, when painters produced lavish flower pieces, laid tables, breakfast pieces and vanitas compositions in which skulls, candles and timepieces reminded viewers of the transience of life. Later masters of the genre include Jean-Baptiste-Siméon Chardin in eighteenth-century France and, in the modern era, Paul Cézanne, whose apples and jugs influenced generations of painters. Victorian artists produced many fruit and bird's-nest studies in oil and watercolour. When buying, consider the quality of the painting, its condition, attribution and any later overpainting or relining. Still life pictures suit dining rooms and kitchens particularly well, and a fine flower piece brings colour to almost any traditional interior.
