Vanitas Still-Life
by RENARD DE SAINT-ANDRÉ, Simon, Oil on canvas
French still-lifes always employed the same monotonous repertoire, without the dense liveliness of Flemish art. Symbols were often included, such as a wisp of straw, an hour glass, skull, or fly that went into a vanitas still-life. Simon Renard de Saint-Andr� might depict a butterfly on the flower, a fly on the skull, or a whole collection of funerary objects, all orchestrated in front of deep red drapes.