Still Life with a Piece of Salmon, a Lemon and Three Vessels

This was painted for a cabinet of natural history. Between 1771 and 1774 Luis Melendez made 44 still lifes for the rooms of the Prince of Asturias, the future Charles IV, and he described the plan himself as an entertaining cabinet holding every kind of food the Spanish climate produces. That is why the salmon is a cut section rather than a whole fish, the flesh and the strip of skin set out for inspection like a specimen, with a single lemon placed apart from the group. The vessels behind are ordinary kitchen gear, copper and a pot of the coarse earthenware made at Alcorcon just outside Madrid, which is what a royal cabinet of Spanish produce needed to show. The canvas is dated 1772, the same year Melendez wrote to the king saying he lacked what he needed to live and to work. At the right the edge of the plank is marked by a small spoon with a very long handle, laid along it.