Still Life with Carp on a Wooden Chip Box

Sebastian Stoskopff, born in the Evangelical-Lutheran city of Strasbourg, is considered to be one of the most prominent still-life painters of his day. From 1622 to 1641, he was active in Paris, where he worked intensively on portraying the five senses and transience (vanitas). Still Life with Carp on a Wooden Chip Box, a painting executed by the artist during this period, shows a large, uncooked carp before a candle that has just been extinguished and a copper tankard with a closed lid. The carp lies in an earthenware dish, which, in turn, rests on top of a chip box on a table. Stoskopff painted several versions of this delicately composed motif, reduced to only a few objects, varying it slightly each time. In doing so, he played primarily with light and shadow in order to render the materiality of the individual objects in a masterfully realistic hand. This Bremen painting is distinguished by its warm, harmonious color tones, whereby it is precisely the glaze-like sheen of the carp’s golden-yellow scales that imbues the still life with a particular glow. Contemporaries interpreted the work as a symbol of Protestant communion—the fish representing the body of Christ and the wooden box being a container for the Host.