{"id":107,"date":"2022-11-19T21:11:05","date_gmt":"2022-11-19T21:11:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/berrow.me.uk\/alison\/?p=107"},"modified":"2022-12-06T16:52:12","modified_gmt":"2022-12-06T16:52:12","slug":"week-six-still-life-memento-mori-and-the-vanitas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/berrow.me.uk\/alison\/week-six-still-life-memento-mori-and-the-vanitas\/","title":{"rendered":"Week 6: Still Life, Memento Mori and the Vanitas."},"content":{"rendered":"

Still Life:\u00a0<\/strong>a work of art that shows inanimate objects from the natural or man-made world.<\/p>\n

Memento Mori<\/strong>:\u00a0 Latin – ‘Remember you must die’<\/p>\n

Vanitas<\/strong>:\u00a0 Latin -‘for vanity, reminding us that vanity and material possessions do not preclude us from death’.<\/p>\n

Todays lecture talked about how images, even seemingly simple ones,\u00a0 can have much deeper meanings.<\/p>\n

Historical still life paintings often show a grand and ornate composition of inanimate objects which symbolise something to the owner who\u00a0 commissioned the artwork.\u00a0 Food, wine, jewels, or similar treasured possessions, celebrations of their wealth would all play a part in the composition.<\/p>\n

Art history also shows that still life images can be devices of great atmosphere, with an underlying message of life and death, or memento mori.\u00a0 \u00a0A burning candle, hour glass,\u00a0 flowers, time pieces, cut flowers that will slowly die, a skull, all representations of the fragility of life and symbols of mortality.\u00a0 Books, wine, musical instruments add to the vanity of the image again signifying wealth, items which we hold dear but are often linked with vanity, which of course in the grand scheme of life have no value.\u00a0 During the 1600’s this type of artwork was in demand and of course at that time God, mortality and the afterlife still had great significance in peoples lives.<\/p>\n

My art intellect is only now beginning to broaden and this is a concept I had not consciously recognised previously.\u00a0 \u00a0 Comparing these historical artworks to the modern counterparts of this same genre can be somewhat challenging.<\/p>\n

I can see how commercial images and advertising plays a part.\u00a0 It promotes fear; the fear of missing out; fear of if we don’t have ‘this’ or ‘that’ item our lives will be poorer [we believe] or selling us the whole lifestyle we may reach if only we obtain the [advertised] item.\u00a0 The basis is always money and vanity.<\/p>\n

There are numerous photographers who each have their own concept of this subject.\u00a0 Some are complex and others take a simpler or even humous view. Edward Steichen was said to be of quite an age when he produced his image Diagram of Doom, perhaps signifying his life was coming to a close like the light of the day and the elongated shadow of the butterfly on the paper.\u00a0 \u00a0 https:\/\/tinyurl.com\/yc4ftknr<\/a><\/p>\n

Emma Hamilton, used to seeing dead animal meat [coming from a family of butchers] used her knowledge of\u00a0 dead flesh and created ‘flowers’ which unless one looked closely look remarkably like the rich coloured still life flower art hanging from a Victorian wall.<\/p>\n

Lucinda Devlin’s ‘The Omega Suites’ had quite a grim reality of prison execution chambers.\u00a0 \u00a0 https:\/\/www.lucindadevlin.com\/the-omega-suites<\/a><\/p>\n

Then there is Sian Bonnell and her ‘Everyday Dada 2003 -5’ in which she takes everyday food and consumables using them in quirky and thought provoking re-purposing ways around the home.\u00a0 https:\/\/www.lucindadevlin.com\/the-omega-suites<\/a><\/p>\n

We have been asked to find our own ‘Magic in the Mundane’ image for this Lecture.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The Dolphin!\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 He wore Blue Velvet roses<\/p>\n

\"\"\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0<\/a>\"\"<\/a>\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Splash of Colour\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Under the microscope or the night sky?<\/p>\n

iphone 7 [+edit]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Still Life:\u00a0a work of art that shows inanimate objects from the natural or man-made world. Memento Mori:\u00a0 Latin – ‘Remember you must die’ Vanitas:\u00a0 Latin -‘for vanity, reminding us that vanity and material possessions do not preclude us from death’. Todays lecture talked about how images, even seemingly simple ones,\u00a0 can have much deeper meanings. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/berrow.me.uk\/alison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/berrow.me.uk\/alison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/berrow.me.uk\/alison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/berrow.me.uk\/alison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/berrow.me.uk\/alison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=107"}],"version-history":[{"count":19,"href":"https:\/\/berrow.me.uk\/alison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":165,"href":"https:\/\/berrow.me.uk\/alison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107\/revisions\/165"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/berrow.me.uk\/alison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=107"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/berrow.me.uk\/alison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=107"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/berrow.me.uk\/alison\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=107"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}