Still life with serpents, fly agarics and thistles
Artist/Maker
DatesMade: Made 1650s
Material / Technique
Dimensionsh x w: Mått 35 x 48 cm h x w x d: Ram 41 x 54 x 5 cm
Inventory numberNM 5272
AcqusitionBequest 1914 Professor P. F. Wahlberg
Other titlesTitle (sv): Stilleben med ormar, flugsvampar och tistlar Title (en): Still life with serpents, fly agarics and thistles Previous: Serpents, Fly Agarics and Thistles Previous: Ormar, flugsvampar och tistlar
DescriptionCatalogue raisonné: Description in Italian Paintings: Three Centuries of Collecting, Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, 2015, cat.no. 108: TECHNICAL NOTES: The support is a single piece of fine, densely woven, plain-weave linen fabric. It has been lined with glue and mounted on a non-original stretcher. The tacking edges are cropped. The ground is beige and covers the whole support. There are some old retouches. Documented restorations: 1920: Cleaned. Dark yellow varnish removed. Varnish; 1955: Remounted. Ironed. Varnish removed. Retouching and varnish; 1994: Reduction of yellowed varnish. Old discoloured retouches adjusted. Varnish PROVENANCE: Byström; Fahlcrantz 1853; Wahlberg; bequest of Professor P. F. Wahlberg. EXHIBITED: Stilleben (NM touring exhibition), Hallands länsmuseer, Museet i Varberg, Varberg, 1987; Älvsborgs länsmuseum, Vänersborg, 1987–88; Alingsås museum, Alingsås, 1988; Kalmar Konstmuseum, Kalmar, 1988; Värmlands Museum, Karlstad, 1988; Landskrona museum, Landskrona, 1988; Blekinge museum, Karlskrona, 1988; Bohusläns museum, Uddevalla, 1988–89; Helsingborgs museum, Helsingborg, 1989; Hälsinglands museum, Hudiksvall, 1989; Örnsköldsviks museum, Örnsköldsvik, 1989; Sundsvalls museum, Sundsvall, 1989; Norrbottens museum, Luleå, 1989; Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, 1995; Hans Gedda & Mörkrets Mästare, Kungliga Akademien för de fria Konsterna, Stockholm, 2013–14; Barockt, Kulturhuset, Stockholm, 2014. BIBLIOGRAPHY: Byström 1853a, p. 5, no. 32; (as anonymous); NM Cat. 1958, p. 158 (as Paolo Porpora); NM Cat. 1990, p. 277 (as Paolo Porpora). The present painting is the companion piece to NM 5271 (cat. no. 107) and displays the same kind of ingenious and powerful contrast between the beauty and ugliness of nature, although the contrast here is of a more subtle nature. The viper poised to strike at the butterfly is the focus of the composition, clearly elaborating on the theme of evil, innocence, and the inevitability of life and death. The picture’s pervasive gloom contrasts nicely with Porpora’s distinct depiction of the textures and hues of the viper’s skin, the butterfly’s wings, the slime of the snail, the shine of the shells, and the unevenness of the thistles and the stone, gravel and sand. The warm red and textured white of the funghi are conspicuously and effectively set off against the dark areas surrounding them. The depiction of the funghi has a great illusionistic realism, the artist managing to convey through quite broad brushstrokes both their sponginess and their brittleness. The viper in the background seems to be attacking the funghi in an act of pronounced viscousness, further enhancing the composition’s contrast between light and darkness. dp [End]
Exhibited
Motif categoryStill life
Collection
TechniquePainting
Keyword