Day #290 – THE MAKING OF A STILL LIFE

I had a tough time this morning.

I am on day #290 and only today does it feel like I woke up not knowing what I wanted to do. I’m always teeming with ideas. I have to say it felt quite strange.

First I thought I’d make some mini-paintings. I’d take a stack of 2″x3″ watercolor paper and see how many tiny paintings I could create in a day.

I wound up staring at tiny blank canvases. I decided to scratch that idea.

Next I took out an art book for inspiration. The book was “The Artist’s Eye” by Harriet Shorr. If you have a minute, click on her name above. Check out her work. It’s amazing. Harriet works VERY LARGE. Roughly 5 feet x 8 feet. Her focus is still-lives. At such a large size, she works on distorting reality. Most things are traditional, yet a few unexpected things pop in or out of her paintings. She is also a bold colorist. This is why I look at her work when I need inspiration!

Harriet Shorr also uses small numbers of objects, generally around three objects on a GIANT canvas. She says it’s to focus the eye, yet also let the eye rest.

I started with three objects. My new day of the dead mug I made in pottery class, an empty Magic Hat #9 beer bottle and a bowl of oranges.

The only problem thus far, is that I’m not Harriet Shorr! Somehow I wound up adding my favorite eye glasses, a brightly colored glass bead necklace and a paintbrush showing signs of love. Now it began looking more like a Mary Ercoli Walsh!

The idea of working large-scale appealed to me as well. However, I have no place to put something 5 feet by 8 feet, so I went with 25 inches by 35 inches which is still PLENTY BIG bby my standards.

I like to photograph my still lives and this is why, I don’t want to wind up with this:

A flat still life. I want the eye to go in and around the objects. In the olden days, artists would create a small frame and look through the frame to accomplish the same thing a lens does for me. Figuring out how to crop what you are seeing. I like to heavily crop objects, so that they then take on a new shape. I like to focus on the negative space, just as much as the positive.