vanitas

American  

[van-i-tahs] / ˈvæn ɪˌtɑs /

noun

1. a type of still-life painting that flourished in the Netherlands from about 1620 to 1650, conveying a religious message and characterized by objects symbolic of mortality and the meaninglessness of worldly pleasures.

---

Etymology

Origin of vanitas

1905–10; Latin: literally, vanity

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

vanitas

Harnett had much simpler taste than his patrons, and while “Ease” is not a vanitas painting auguring death, he was known for incorporating traces of humor and irony in his paintings.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 28, 2025

Yet pronk works carried deeper meanings as the earliest forms of vanitas, a genre that uses symbolism to convey the brevity of life and futility of pleasure.

From Salon ● Mar. 10, 2024

These include bright, vivid self-portraits in which she’s surrounded by various animals; canvases devoted to wide-eyed felines; and a large-scale painting that resembles a tarot-inspired vanitas.

From New York Times ● Jul. 29, 2021

And she picked up on the morbid side of me — I have a collection of hourglasses and vanitas things with skulls.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 18, 2017

But under the pages of both there sounds incessantly the hoarse bass of vanitas vanitatum, omnia vanitas, which the reader may hear, whenever he will, between the lines.

From The Will to Believe : and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy by William James