Scrapbook Entry#16 Fruit and Vegetables

When growing up and learning about how to draw and how to paint the first step was always the still life. It often featured a bowl with fruit and vegetables placed strategically inside and then carefully placed on a slightly folded cloth hanging of the edge of a table. Although I at first hated doing still lifes, thinking that they were so boring and posed, I began to become intrigued by the variety of colors the fruit and vegetables had to offer. The vibrancy of an orange against a ripe red pepper or a bright green apple next to the yellow of a banana. I enjoyed working with such vibrant paints and mixing colors to create the exact color of each object. I found the variety of textures to also be fascinating. The dimples in the orange contrasted against the waxiness of an apple, the seeds of a strawberry compared to the hairiness of a kiwi. I am not only intrigued by fruits and vegetables in the context of a painting but in food as well. The variety of flavors, the different way each is encased in a peel or not, the contrast of the inside and outside. It is interesting to me how such natural things can be so bizarre and unique. In conclusion it is not the fruit and vegetables in a still life that is the art, but rather the way the painter's hand interprets these objects. However I believe that the evolution of such a painting starts with the objects themselves therefore the fruit and vegetables deserve our attention.