Edwaert Collier (Breda active before 1663 - 1708 Leiden (?)), A vanitas still life with a skull surmounting an upturned crown, an astrological globe, an hourglass, a book, a shell with soap bubbles and a portrait of the emperor Augustus on a draped table, inscribed on the paper by the book lower left HOMOEST/SIMILIS/BULLAE. and on the paper above the hourglass upper right: SIC FUGITT./IRRE. PARABILE/TEMUS., oil on canvas, 29 3/4  by 25 in.; 75.5 by 63.5 cm. Estimate 80,000 — 120,000 USD. Photo Sotheby's

Provenance: Anonymous sale, London, Christie's, 24 April 1998, lot 62;
There acquired by the present collector.

Notes: Collier was born in Breda and trained in Haarlem in the early 1660s, where he is recorded in a list of guild members.  The artist's residence in Leiden is fully documented from 1667 to 1693, after which time he worked in London, returning to Leiden from circa 1702 to 1706.  It appears that he was working again in England by 1707, as his last known work is dated to that year and inscribed fecit London. 

This painting is a variant of Collier's still life in the Heinz collection, Washington, which is signed and dated, E.kolier. 1663.1

We are grateful to Fred. G. Meijer for endorsing the attribution and suggesting a dating close to that of the painting in the Heinz collection.

I. Bergström and A.K. Wheelock, Still Lifes of the Golden Age: Northern European Paintings from the Heinz family collection, exhibition catalogue, Washington DC 1989, p.102, cat. no. 11.

Sotheby's. Master Paintings & Sculpture Day Sale, New York, 29 janv. 2016, 10:00 AM