Willem Kalf
Still Life with a Porcelain Vase, Silver-gilt Ewer, and Glassescirca 1643-1644

On view:

Geffen Galleries

Oil painting still life with a gilded ewer, tipped blue-and-white ceramic vessel, wine glass, and halved orange arranged on two surfaces against a dark background

Artist or Maker: Willem Kalf
Northern Netherlands, 1619-1693
Title: Still Life with a Porcelain Vase, Silver-gilt Ewer, and Glasses
Date Made: circa 1643-1644
Medium: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: Canvas: 21 7/8 × 17 1/2 in. (55.56 × 44.45 cm) Framed: 29 1/2 × 25 × 2 in. (74.93 × 63.5 × 5.08 cm)
Credit Line: Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Edward William Carter
Accession Number: M.2009.106.22
Classification: Paintings
Collecting Area: European Painting and Sculpture
Curatorial Notes: With its austere dark background, Willem Kalf’s painting keeps the focus on a group of objects balanced at the corner of a stone table: a half-orange, a group of glassware, a large ewer, a bowl of olives, a blue-and-white Chinese porcelain bottle, a timepiece, a knife, and a plate. These items represent both Dutch production and goods imported through global trade. The cut-glass bowl and wineglasses were likely made locally in imitation of prized Venetian glassware. The Chinese globular bottle was a design produced expressly for the Dutch East India Company around 1620 to 1680. The elaborately chased silver-gilt ewer resembles those made in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries in France and Germany, usually decorated with classical motifs. Citrus was harvested in both southern Europe and as far afield as the Dutch colonies. Here, the orange may also reference William II, prince of Orange and stadtholder of the United Provinces of the Netherlands.

Kalf’s picture belongs to a genre of still-life painting called pronkstilleven (pronk meaning “to show”). These opulent compositions highlighted expensive luxury commodities and, as showpieces designed to celebrate abundance, their visual excess signified not only the owner’s social status but also countrywide affluence. Yet embedded in many of these scenes are warnings against worldly ambitions and reminders of life’s transience.

Scholars debate the meaning of Kalf’s painting. In purely aesthetic terms, each object depicted presents an opportunity to demonstrate the artist’s skill in meticulously capturing the reflection of light and the textures of different materials. But is this assemblage of luxury items a celebration of abundance or an admonition against decadence? The precariously balanced pewter plate, the prominently dangling watch, the fragile porcelain lying askew, and the partially obscured figure of Temperance on the ewer suggest an uneasy relationship to materiality.
Provenance: J. Braz,(1) Leningrad and Paris (estate sale, Paris, Charpentier [Alphonse Bellier], 12 May 1938, lot 13, pl. V). [art market, Amsterdam]. F. G. J. Beerkens,(2) Haarlem, by 1939, sold 1983 to; [Hoogsteder- Naumann, Ltd., New York, sold 1983 to]; Mr. and Mrs. Edward William Carter, Los Angeles, given 2009 to; LACMA.

Footnotes

(1) Probably the artist Osip Braz, aka Josif (1873–1936), who painted in Germany and France and was elected member of the Counsel of the Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg, where he became conservator of the Dutch collection of the museum.

(2) F. G. J. Beerkens was the director of a business that specialized in fine woods: oak, mahogany, teak, etc. The company operated in Haarlem from 1919 to 1969.
Selected Bibliography: Walsh, Jr., John., and Cynthis P. Schneider. A Mirror of Nature: Dutch Paintings from the Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Edward William Carter (Second Edition). Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 1992.
Grisebach, Lucius. Willem Kalf, 1619-1693. Berlin: Gebr. Mann Verlag, 1974.
Walsh, Amy L. The Mr. and Mrs. Edward Carter Collection of Dutch Paintings. Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 2019. https://archive.org/details/Carter_Collection_Dutch_Paintings (accessed May 23, 2022).

Related Unframed

Fall into These Autumnal Collection Highlights

September 20, 2024
Alexander Schneider

Willem Kalf
Still Life with a Porcelain Vase, Silver-gilt Ewer, and Glassescirca 1643-1644

On view:

Geffen Galleries

Artist or Maker: Willem Kalf
Northern Netherlands, 1619-1693
Title: Still Life with a Porcelain Vase, Silver-gilt Ewer, and Glasses
Date Made: circa 1643-1644
Medium: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: Canvas: 21 7/8 × 17 1/2 in. (55.56 × 44.45 cm) Framed: 29 1/2 × 25 × 2 in. (74.93 × 63.5 × 5.08 cm)
Credit Line: Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Edward William Carter
Accession Number: M.2009.106.22
Classification: Paintings
Collecting Area: European Painting and Sculpture
Curatorial Notes: With its austere dark background, Willem Kalf’s painting keeps the focus on a group of objects balanced at the corner of a stone table: a half-orange, a group of glassware, a large ewer, a bowl of olives, a blue-and-white Chinese porcelain bottle, a timepiece, a knife, and a plate. These items represent both Dutch production and goods imported through global trade. The cut-glass bowl and wineglasses were likely made locally in imitation of prized Venetian glassware. The Chinese globular bottle was a design produced expressly for the Dutch East India Company around 1620 to 1680. The elaborately chased silver-gilt ewer resembles those made in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries in France and Germany, usually decorated with classical motifs. Citrus was harvested in both southern Europe and as far afield as the Dutch colonies. Here, the orange may also reference William II, prince of Orange and stadtholder of the United Provinces of the Netherlands.

Kalf’s picture belongs to a genre of still-life painting called pronkstilleven (pronk meaning “to show”). These opulent compositions highlighted expensive luxury commodities and, as showpieces designed to celebrate abundance, their visual excess signified not only the owner’s social status but also countrywide affluence. Yet embedded in many of these scenes are warnings against worldly ambitions and reminders of life’s transience.

Scholars debate the meaning of Kalf’s painting. In purely aesthetic terms, each object depicted presents an opportunity to demonstrate the artist’s skill in meticulously capturing the reflection of light and the textures of different materials. But is this assemblage of luxury items a celebration of abundance or an admonition against decadence? The precariously balanced pewter plate, the prominently dangling watch, the fragile porcelain lying askew, and the partially obscured figure of Temperance on the ewer suggest an uneasy relationship to materiality.
Provenance: J. Braz,(1) Leningrad and Paris (estate sale, Paris, Charpentier [Alphonse Bellier], 12 May 1938, lot 13, pl. V). [art market, Amsterdam]. F. G. J. Beerkens,(2) Haarlem, by 1939, sold 1983 to; [Hoogsteder- Naumann, Ltd., New York, sold 1983 to]; Mr. and Mrs. Edward William Carter, Los Angeles, given 2009 to; LACMA.

Footnotes

(1) Probably the artist Osip Braz, aka Josif (1873–1936), who painted in Germany and France and was elected member of the Counsel of the Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg, where he became conservator of the Dutch collection of the museum.

(2) F. G. J. Beerkens was the director of a business that specialized in fine woods: oak, mahogany, teak, etc. The company operated in Haarlem from 1919 to 1969.
Selected Bibliography: Walsh, Jr., John., and Cynthis P. Schneider. A Mirror of Nature: Dutch Paintings from the Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Edward William Carter (Second Edition). Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 1992.
Grisebach, Lucius. Willem Kalf, 1619-1693. Berlin: Gebr. Mann Verlag, 1974.
Walsh, Amy L. The Mr. and Mrs. Edward Carter Collection of Dutch Paintings. Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 2019. https://archive.org/details/Carter_Collection_Dutch_Paintings (accessed May 23, 2022).

Related Unframed

Fall into These Autumnal Collection Highlights

September 20, 2024
Alexander Schneider