PORPORA, PAOLO
STILL LIFE WITH MUSHROOMS
Considered as the work of a 17th-century Dutch master; attributed to Porpora by M.Y.Libman.
Similar still-life compositions are linked with the idea of 'vanitas', the allegory of 'vanity of vanities', which was widely incorporated into 17th-century art. Here it is not difficult to discern the link between the works of the Dutch masters in this genre – Marseus van Schrik and Mattias Vithos who worked in Rome 1652-56.
Provenance: acquired by D.I.Shchukin from L.G.Lukutina in the first decade of the 20th-century; in the Museum of Old Western Art (Moscow) in 1917; in the Pushkin Museum since 1928.
