Inherently Boring? Turns out, no!
I recently read a comment that still life was inherently boring, and this is definitely what I've always thought. I haven't painted still life since college (22 years ago!), and didn't feel moved by it then and only did it because I had to. For me, painting has always been about my ideas and philosophies, getting them out of my head in physical, visual format. Recently, I've found myself just as interested in the act of painting itself; how it feels, the choices one makes whilst in progress. I found myself wanting to paint all of the things, simply to move the brush about on the paper. Out of nowhere I decided, "OMG SHY, let's do a still life!" What, really? "Yeah, it's gunna be awesome!" I collected some bits together and started. Oh my goodness, it's not boring in the least!
Above: the two still life paintings I've done recently. Both were painted alla prima in one session each.
The choices are absolutely unreal. What objects? What composition? What colour palette? I don't know why, but it never occurred to me just how many personal decisions go into a still life painting. Still life painting is built completely from the ground up. You start with nothing, you have to choose and arrange your objects, choose your colours, and then like magic there's a beautiful painting. Just, wow.
For the first, I chose my rabbit skull, which I've had since I was a small child. I don't even remember where it came from or how I came to have it, it's just always been a feature of my stuff. I chose dice because I love dice games, I love numbers, and I love shapes. There are three dice because three and nine are my favourite numbers. I chose the quartz point because I love quartz, the inclusions inside quartz stones remind me of secrets. The flowers are just pretty, and the weird brown holey thing (which I think may have contained seeds?) is just interesting. The painting itself just flowed and I finished up with a sense of wonder, I couldn't believe I'd painted that!
Spurred on by the success of the first, I tried again. There is a jackdaw egg I was lucky enough to find a few years ago, along with some feathers from a red kite, a little owl, and a female sparrowhawk, which are all birds that live around my workplace. The dark, plain feather is from my beloved pigeon friend, Honor. The lexicon cards spell out my initials because my name is deeply precious to me. There is another quartz, and a piece of labradorite. The symbol of Tyr is there because Tyr represents justice, order, courage, and sacrifice, which are all important values to me. And then there are some more pretty flowers.
I have no concept if these paintings are anywhere near as interesting to others as they are to me, as deeply personal as they are, but I truly love them.
My still life palette consists of titanium white, Naples yellow light, raw sienna, rose blush, Mars violet, indigo, and Payne's grey:
Above: Winsor & Newton's rosh blush - Naples yellow light - indigo
Above: Jackson's Mars violet - raw sienna - Payne's grey.
I can't make greens or any saturated colours, and I love it. I don't care about accurately painting all of the colours, I chose this palette because I want a certain mood and a cohesive feel to the series. It's a weird palette, but very beautifully subtle.
