Still Life
Sam Taylor-Johnson
(British, born in 1967)
2001
Country of Origin, for CustomsUnited Kingdom
Medium/Technique35mm film / DVD; color, silent.
DimensionsDuration: 3 minutes, 44 seconds
Aspect Ratio: 4:3
Aspect Ratio: 4:3
Credit LineCatherine and Paul Buttenwieser Fund
Accession number2008.645
On View
Not on viewClassificationsElectronic media
Collections
In this piece Taylor-Johnson (formerly Taylor-Wood) references vanitas, a type of still-life prominent in 16th- and 17th-century Northern European painting. Artists working in this style paired symbols of death and decay with fruits and flowers, a haunting reminder of the fleeting nature of life on earth and the decadence of worldly pleasures. In Taylor-Johnson’s time-based work, a tray of beautiful fruit decomposes until nothing is left but a formless grey mass. The cheap plastic pen on the table, however, remains unchanged, quietly raising the environmental question of what will be left behind after we are gone.
Provenance2008, sold by Jay Jopling/White Cube, London, to the MFA. (Accession Date: September 17, 2008)
CopyrightReproduced with permission.