Pieter Claez Still Life with Wine Glass and Silver Bowl oil on panel 1635 I have been reading about Pieter Claez, and thinking about the silence of still life paintings. Still Life is the quietest of genres: an entrance to the world of objects, observations of the things around us, those mute possessions that are always still, yet not without experience, which is a kind of living. Claez's almost monochromatic paintings with their solemn, silvery-golden light are the direct predecessors, I think, to similarly spare and remarkably silent paintings by Chardin, Peale, and Morandi. Jean-Baptiste-Simeon Chardin Still Life with White Mug oil on canvas 1764 Raphaellle Peale Still Life with Cake oil on canvas 1816 Giorgio Morandi Natura Morta 1946
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Still Life with Sunflowers graphite on paper 2016 Waiting at the Gate watercolor on Arches paper 2016 April was a busy, stormy month, full of setbacks, sadness, and some happy conversations and outings, and it has taken me some time to add my most recent watercolor and drawing to the website, but they are there now. My dear rat Whitman passed away, and it has been lonely and quiet without him. My husband took me and Gia (our dog) camping for the first time, and she was like a puppy again in the wildflowers. I have been reading about Paula Modersohn Becker and fairy-tales, and thinking about the lives of women. We planted seven trees, mostly flowering dogwoods, in a cemetery last week to shade the lonely white houses of the dead.
This next month will be busy, too, with a trip home planned, a rather large painting I have been working on for several months that I hope I will finish, and some new drawings and paintings I am starting now. The sun has come back, and the wind, and the trees are green when I walk under them. It is spring. . . It is almost summer. . . To Barbara: I apologize for not responding to your comment sooner. I don't have internet access at my apartment, so I go out and borrow some once a month or so to update this website. I am also not quite certain how to respond to comments using this website platform, and don't have your e-mail, so I thought I would write a note to you here in case you come back to read again. Thank you for your interest, and for your kindness. I apologize on the gallery's behalf; they should have been polite enough to e-mail you back and let you know I haven't shown with them since before I moved north last year. If you do need anything, feel free to e-mail me at thegiftofasher@yahoo.com. |
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