Still Life with Skull by Paul Cezanne
Paul Cezanne’s Still Life with a Skull is a piece of work that features a skull, fruits, and a piece of white cloth placed on a table and features a dark background. The artists seems to have created depth of perspective and space using planes of color through contrast. The work represents an essential and powerful link between the materialistic artistic movement of expressionism and the ephemeral features of Impressionism. It was done in the Post-Impressionist era having being completed in 1898. This was termed as the final period. The piece takes the vanitas genre of art, which features still life and is oil on canvas measuring 65.4 by 54.3 centimeters. The still life show volume and create a tonal harmony without sensual or tactile appeal. It is exhibited at the Barnes Foundation, Merion, Pennsylvania, USA and originated from France.
Still Life with a Skull and Writing Quill by Pieter Claesz
This painting was done in 1628 using oil on wood measuring 24.1 by 35.9 centimeters. The piece of work features a skull, a writing quill, an overturned wine glass, candle holder, ink pot, and books placed on a table. It also features a dark background. The piece is a still life in the vanitas genre of art and was done during the Dutch golden …show more content…
Artists use motifs to pass messages, for instance in these two pieces of art, the artists use the skull to portray the eminence and certainty of death. Other features are included to show brevity and the transient nature of life with fruits that are seen as attractive to look at bitter to taste. Moreover, the vanitas present a cultural and historic debate regarding their presence without explicit imagery created by skulls. The two pieces also led to art that was obsessed with death and decay as well as painting of attractive