Vanitas Still Life

When Pieter Claesz painted this small panel in 1625, he had been working in Haarlem for only a few years, and he had not yet narrowed his tables to the greys and greens that later became his trademark. There is still colour here. On the table stand a brass candlestick holding the crusted stub of a candle, a skull, a pocket watch on a blue silk ribbon, a letter with a pen and an inkpot, a walnut, and at the very edge a red and white anemone. Each object was a familiar reminder that time runs out. The flower had a story of its own. The Roman poet Ovid tells how the anemone sprang from the blood of Adonis, the young hunter loved by Venus, and how the winds that open its petals soon blow them away, which is why it was called the windflower. The Frans Hals Museum notes that Claesz usually celebrated the good things of life, and that this panel is far gloomier. The candle has almost burned down.