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Lecture 1 - Still-life Painting

Listen to part of a lecture in an art class.

Professor: This week you are going to be studying something new, a painting in still-life. First I want to give you a little background that might be helpful when you start working. We spend a lot of time on portrays in this class and moving from painting people to painting objects, might feel like a big shift. But I think it’s important for you to understand that you could pack just as much life and vibrancy and excitement into a painting of a bowl of fruit as you can into something more dynamic.

And, you know, still-lives don’t just need to be straightforward representations. A lot of still-life painters really use the simplicity of the style to send a message or tell a story, even portrays sometimes include elements of still-life paintings. For example, in a portray, there might be a map, hanging on the wall. Or there might be some books on the table next to the subject. These objects tell you something about the subject like maybe that person was well-educated.

A big part of still-life painting is the use of those kinds of symbols. The objects you include can provide more contacts than help convey your message. I’d also like to show everyone an example of still-life that we can talk about a little and use to get some inspiration.

This is by James Peale, one of the true masters of the art of still-life. This piece is called Still-life, bowls, some apples and vegetables. And it’s a really, really great example of what I’m going to be looking forward in your painting.

Now, Peale did his work in the early 19th century. And painters of that period approached still-life painting from a scientific perspective. Let’s look at this painting to help you understand what I mean. See the red tomatoes in the foreground and how vibrant that color is? And if you look at the large heads of cabbage farther back, every detail, every crinkle in each leaf, all the fruits, are so precise. They are almost like a sketch you’d see in a field guide. Peale and other painters of this era used still-life painting as a way of exploring the natural world and satisfying their curiosity about nature.

So now we can take some time to discuss a little more of… more about the… the actual process of still-life painting. Now, before you paint a single stroke, you’ve got to plan the composition of your painting. You know, the arrangement of the objects to make sure everything is set up the way you wanted. I remember a still life piece I painted when I was in university. It was vegetables I think and I had created sketches of the setting. But then I realized the arrangement of the vegetables in a basket just, just didn’t look right. So I had to start over. So I can say from experience it’s really important to make sure your arrangement is just right before you even start painting.

Now, what are some ways to make sure the composition of your painting is the way you want it to be? Well, it’s important in the still-life to make sure you’re not overdoing the amount of positive space, the amount of stuff in your piece. The still-life really is not just about the subject matter. If you make a really cluttered composition with too much going on, it can throw off your painting. That’s something you notice in the James Peale painting. Notice how it really… you know it makes great use of negative space, you can see how he sort of embraces those little empty spots on the table. And that adds a really nice sense of balance.

Also, try to make your still-life look natural. If it looks contrived and if it’s obvious a person deliberately arranged everything, it takes away from the simplicity and the natural feel of the work. Basically the best still-life paintings are the ones where the objects don’t look arranged for the painting at all, but that those tomatoes are near that cabbage on a table by accident.