Still-Life

1770 · Private collection

still-life

Meléndez's still lifes, like this one, are simple compositions representing everyday objects with a monumentality and rigour that mark a sharp contrast with their ordinariness. Obsessed with meaningful details and different textures, he turned to motifs such as fruit, pots and pans, bread, vegetables, etc. , arranging them in infinite variations.

About the Artist

Luis Meléndez

1716 – 1780

Spanish still-life painter, active mainly in Madrid. He is regarded as the finest Spanish painter in his speciality in the 18 th century continuing the austere traditions of the 'bodegón' established by Sanchez Cotán, as well as Velázquez and Zurbarán. He is sometimes called 'the Spanish Chardin' but he spent much of his life in poverty. He was trained by his father and L. M. van Loo in Spain. He was van Loo's assistant 1742-48. He worked in Madrid and revisited Italy before 1775. His work is rare outside Spain, but there is an example in the National Gallery in London and the Louvre in Paris has a striking self-portrait, signed and dated 1746. The self-portrait is his earliest known work, in which he looks younger than thirty.

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