Expressing a weariness with this life and yearning for the next, they originated in Flanders, but soon became popular in the Dutch Republic in its Golden Age.
van Hemessen
Associated with the fire of the underworld, painted into life by Jupiter, attracted by Psyche, hunted on expeditions, in vanitas paintings, or just for their beauty.
Originating in the Northern Renaissance, these paintings expressed feelings of emptiness, and the futility of earthly life. Examples of these elaborate allegories.
From Pisanello and Dosso Dossi to William Holman Hunt and Richard Dadd: paintings showing butterflies.
It’s sometimes hard to read a painting without understanding an inscription. Masaccio, Rossetti, Moreau, Corinth and Botticelli gives us some clues.
Curious still lifes and more containing allegories about the emptiness and futility of life on earth, and its brevity. Even seen in Cézanne and Jacek Malczewski.
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