Anonymous Artist working in the Alpine Region Open Missal ca. 1490-1510 oil on panel (cut down from larger work) private collection |
Andrea del Sarto The Eucharist (detail of Pietà with Saints) ca. 1523-24 oil on panel Palazzo Pitti, Florence |
Anonymous Spanish Artist Memento Mori ca. 1550 oil on panel private collection |
Girolamo Macchietti Lighted Lamp on a Table (detail of Charity of St Nicholas of Bari) ca. 1570 oil on canvas National Gallery, London |
Johannes Torrentius Still Life with a Bridle 1614 oil on panel Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam |
The documentary film Mysterious Masterpiece, released in 2016, investigates the life of 17th century Dutch master Johannes Torrentius and his enigmatic Still Life with a Bridle – the only painting from his hand that has survived. It was found in 1914 in a small provincial town in the Netherlands, where it had served for years as the lid of a raisin barrel in a grocery shop. How it was made remains a mystery. Traces of oil paint were never found, nor any brushstrokes. According to the painter himself, he never used brushes. He lay his panels flat on the floor, mixed his pigments, and when the work was finished, he declared, one could hear the sweet humming of bees above the panel. Torrentius was a libertine and possibly a Rosicrucian. He was jailed in 1627, tortured, and condemned to twenty years imprisonment for heresy and blasphemy. Most of his works were confiscated. After spending two years in jail he was permitted by the Dutch royal family to leave the country as a gesture to serve the art-collecting ambitions of the English king Charles I. Still Life with a Bridle was painted for Charles and bears his cipher on the back, but was dispersed in the 1650s (along with much of the rest of his collection) after the king's execution under the triumphant Commonwealth.
– adapted from publicity materials for the Torrentius documentary
Matteo Loves The Magdalen contemplating a Crucifix (detail) ca. 1630 oil on canvas Fondazione Cavallini Sgarbi, Ferrara |
Harmen Steenwijck Vanitas Still Life ca. 1640 oil on panel National Gallery, London |
Hubert van Ravesteyn Still Life before 1691 oil on panel Guildhall Art Gallery, London |
follower of Pieter van Roestraten Teapot, Ginger Jar and Slave Candlestick ca. 1695 oil on canvas Victoria & Albert Museum, London |
Adriaen Coorte Five Shells on a Stone Shelf 1696 oil on panel Musée du Louvre |
Nicolas de Largillière Portrait of the Duchess of Beaufort (detail) ca. 1730 oil on canvas Musée Cognacq-Jay, Paris |
Henk Bremmer Still Life with Books and Chinese Vase 1895 oil on canvas Indianapolis Museum of Art |
Tiffany & Co., New York The Wade Necklace ca. 1900 diamonds set in platinum and gold Cleveland Museum of Art |
Koloman Moser (designer) Wastebasket produced by the Wiener Werkstätte ca. 1904 painted sheet-metal Musée d'Orsay, Paris |
Kurt Schwitters Untitled (Relief with Red Pyramid) ca. 1927-30 oil paint on wood-relief, mounted on plywood Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh |