Paulette Tavormina

Juan Sánchez Cotán lived 400 years ago, yet his still life paintings feel much more recent – modern even. And they continue to inspire other contemporary artists. Here are some modern takes on his most famous artwork Quince, Cabbage, Melon and Cucumber, 1602

Quince, Cabbage, Melon and Cucumber, 1602, Juan Sánchez Cotán

Cabbage & Melon, After J.S.C., 2010, Paulette Tavormina

Paulette Tavormina is a fine art photographer whose work is heavily influenced by seventeenth-century Old Master Still Life painters. This one is part of her Natura Morta series. As she says in her artist statement:

‘The Natura Morta images I have made in response to the Old Masters are intensely personal interpretations of timeless, universal stories. Years from now, I hope that the photographs I create will affect someone as deeply as the Old Masters’ paintings have affected me. In one of these paintings, the artist included the words “Eram Qvod Es.” The translation resonates within me: “Once I was what you are now.”‘ PT

Ori Gersht

Pomegranate, 2006, Ori Gersht

Ori Gersht is an Israeli artist exploring themes of beauty and violence through his Pomegranate series (you can also see the video here). As he says in this article:

‘Violence can be very grotesque and also intensely attractive. What interests me is how the two—beauty and violence—live side by side, and how moments can be created and erased almost simultaneously. Destruction is painful, but at times it can be very cathartic.’ OG

Richard Kolker

After Juan Sanchez Cotan 1602, 2014, Richard Kolker

Richard Kolker reconstructed Quince, Cabbage Melon and Cucumber as a computer generated graphic; and he explains why here:

‘Juan Sanchez Cotan’s 1602 painting, Quince, Cabbage, Melon and Cucumber, although 400 years old, refers to many of the visual signifiers of a computer generated image. The preciseness of the composition and Cotan’s handling of light, together with geometric forms of the fruit, themselves, that reflect the geometric primitives which comprise the building blocks of the 3D computer generated space, led me to construct a response as a way of exploring the three dimensional space of the virtual, computer generated environment.’ RK