Following in the tradition of a favorite female artist, the Italian Giovanna Garzoni, I explore themes of foods and landscapes as they are in a state of flux with climate change, and still life to find the meditative beauty in the ordinary and the extraordinary in the often overlooked.
Still life paintings by the Old Masters often depict objects symbolizing the wealth of the client who commissioned the piece. The paintings themselves became another way to showcase the owner’s wealth. In today’s fast-paced life, the desire for material possessions has been replaced for many by the longing for time to slow down and live in greater awareness of the present moment. In capturing a moment, today’s still life and landscape paintings offer the viewer an experience of that wished-for luxury of time, an opportunity to see and contemplate the luminous qualities of everyday objects, nature, or landscapes.
Like the Old Masters, I enjoy finding the gemlike qualities of everyday scenes and objects: iridescence, color changes where light hits a curve, shapes refracted through a water-filled glass bottle, shadows and reflections in landscapes.
