Still life for springtime
Morning washes a bowl of fruit in light, apricots and dimpled oranges
shadow pools in the folds of a linen table cloth
a coffee pot rises to a lantern lid, taste of bitter-smooth amber with a curl of sweetness
yellow roses bow, stems glimpsed through the vase’s translucence
broad beans spill out of a brown paper bag, smelling exactly like the colour green
stacks of books lie open, pages billow like a poet’s sleeve
bottled wine beside an upturned bell glass, half-moons of highlight curved like smiles
Absence, presence, silence, movement. The pictures might be all circles, blushing in natural light, full of promise. Sometimes they are ripeness to the point of rot, browning petals turning into sticky-legged flies. Other times they are jigsaws or stained glass, prismed, unstable.
Traditionally, the still life genre was ranked lowest in the hierarchy of ‘western’ art, below history and mythological paintings, portraiture, landscapes, and animals. The subjects of still life - inanimate, man-made or natural objects, including food, flowers, shells, wine and ceramics - are often subordinated to the form and style of the complete work, a neutral base for experimentation. At first I think most of those pleasingly gloomy memento mori paintings of the early modern era, jewel-like and theatrical. Yet more recently the genre conveys to me the idea of freshness. Perfect for the slow unbending brought about by the beginning of spring.
I find still life strangely comforting. It captures the interest and beauty of mundane things, the things that sustain and nourish. It can be so easy to lose this appreciation, especially during this last locked-down winter. The repetitive tasks of mask-clad shopping, laying out, clearing away, cooking, washing up, all to keep this one body’s machinery going; the cut flowers picked up out of desperation for a dose of cheer; the drinks that took the edge off anxiety over rent. Still life infuses these materials with a dignity and a joy that I can cherish easily now there is sunlight in the window, but struggle to see during the dreich times.
I begin to visualise still life in response to any stimulus, snapshots of compositions and life lived alongside them. They’re brought to mind by films, instagram posts, and song lyrics. Joni Mitchell sings Oh I am a lonely painter/I live in a box of paints. And Maybe I’ll go to Amsterdam/Maybe I’ll go to Rome/And rent me a grand piano/And put some flowers round my room.
Clumps of messy household objects assume a new dignity (some people just belong with dust and clutter, and I know now I have little control over this magnetism). The hair comb stuck in my pencil pot, the pens and paintbrushes in my unzipped makeup bag, my unruly houseplants, the tangled jewellery and discarded hair ties, the cheap souvenirs I have amassed over years, like the Athena statuette I got on a school trip to Greece.
These are the traces of living. Here is the evidence of time travel, some kind of passage. I really seem to exist after all.
Still life paintings are my windows into spring.
The first image is a painting by Vanessa Bell c. 1933
Two of the pictures here were made by lovely friends and artists Karin and Harriet.
You can find more of their beautiful work here:
@karin_ashkar and website
What are your windows into spring?
Loved this, sure to see the mess in my room in a different light!