Assignment 02: "still life"

I put still life in quotes because this isn't a still life: this assignment is to make a painting based loosely on the objects we've chosen. I haven't thought about objects in this way before and I find it really exciting because it's opening up the possibilities of what representation can look like.
We started by talking about the boring, dead, and false idea of plenty that the Dutch still life school pioneered. When you take into account that the hens, fruits, and flowers they were painting would have decomposed beyond recognition before they finished the painting, you wonder about the authenticity of these so-called "real" paintings (art = artifice . . . when is it every, really, about the truth lol). Also, it's interesting to see the limitations of copying from a camera obscura in the out of whack perspectives and other technical problems said copying produced.

Abraham Mignon

Next we skipped ahead to Morandi who's work I enjoy. The idea of using "his bottles" as a method of working and an excuse for which a painting can be made is a potent one: interest in the banal. I also love the modernist bent with positive/negative relationships and greyscales! (I love greys!)

Giorgio Morandi

We skipped even further to Rosenquist (who is not necessarily a still life painter) who uses objects and fractured space to create layers of meaning.

James Rosenquist

A new (to me) artist is Neo Rauch. He creates a pseudo-narrative with his objects: how the objects relate to each other in the painting is what the painting is about.

Neo Rauch

What we are tasked to do with this assignment is to find ways to control the objects we've chosen so that we can create an interesting painting: not a still life!

First hit :)