Still Life
Rechtstraat 51
A wicker basket filled with plump peaches, pears, apples, and grapes sits alongside a plastic ballpoint pen, set against a subdued, umber-toned background. The ripe fruit seems irresistible until a veil of mould gradually engulfs it. Colours fade, skins shrivel, and what remains is a grey, formless sludge. Meanwhile, the pen remains motionless, unaffected, and pristine.
Sam Taylor-Johnson’s Still Life draws on Spanish 17th-century bodegón paintings in which humble foodstuffs are bathed in sparse light against an austere backdrop. Unlike the luxury and abundance found in Dutch and Flemish still lifes, bodegones encourage a sense of gratitude and reverence for God’s creation by emphasising simplicity, ephemerality, and everyday beauty.
This video draws a distinction between life’s fleeting nature and the enduring permanence of the inanimate. As the fruit decomposes and dissolves in an endless loop of decay, the plastic, exempt from nature’s rhythms, remains unchanged. Still Life unflinchingly shows that everything decays except the plastic that outlives us all.
Thanks to Piet van Dijk.