At first glance, a seventeenth-century Dutch still life looks like a peaceful arrangement: a table, some books, a glass, fruit, flowers. Look again, and you might find a skull among the books, a candle just snuffed out, a watch with its lid open.
These paintings are called vanitas, from the Latin of the Book of Ecclesiastes, often translated as "vanity of vanities, all is vanity". They were made to remind viewers, gently but firmly, that life is short and earthly things don't last.
A small dictionary of vanitas symbols
- Skull: the most direct reminder of death. - Snuffed candle or extinguished lamp: a life ending, the flame gone out. - Hourglass or watch: time passing. - Flowers: beauty that will fade, often painted with a petal falling or an insect on a leaf. - Soap bubbles: the fragility of life, gone in an instant. - Overturned glass or empty shell: emptiness, pleasures that pass. - Books, instruments, coins: knowledge, music and wealth, none of which you can take with you. - Ripe or rotting fruit: the moment just before decay.
Where to see them
Look for Harmen Steenwyck's An Allegory of the Vanities of Human Life (around 1640) at the National Gallery in London, or the many still lifes in the Louvre's Dutch galleries. Once you know the symbols, every table becomes a sentence.
Why it isn't gloomy
It's tempting to find vanitas paintings morbid. But many people find them strangely calming. They don't say "despair". They say "notice". If time is short, then this moment, this fruit, this light on the glass, matters. It's the same message at the heart of meditation.
A vanitas meditation
Choose one still life. Find every symbol you recognize, slowly, one at a time. For each, ask: what does this remind me to cherish today? End with three breaths and one thing you want to enjoy fully before the day is over.
Keep your own collection of moments
If you'd like to remember the paintings that make you pause, The Collector's Diary is a free printable journal with a short guided meditation. Its prompts help you note where you met a work, what you noticed first and how it made you feel. A modern vanitas: proof that you were here, and paid attention.
Remember to take as much time as you need, and meet me at the next one.
Love, Evi