Sunday, October 24, 2010

PURSUED BY APPLES

I have a thing about apples, not so much about eating them as painting them. I like eating them too but that's nothing to do with my attraction to them as models. There's something basic, down to earth and yet mysterious about the shape and colour of an apple and, if you want to dwell on the mysterious, of course there's all that mythological apple-lore. The fact that I happen to have an Apple computer is neither here or there. 

Every so often I go back to painting an apple in order to try and capture what else  is going on: what is Appleness? What's happening when my eyes and consciousness meet this apple? What is there that isn't obvious? 

Here's my latest apple, finished yesterday, painted entirely with a palette knife. My model was just one apple placed on a slanting drawing board, supported by a bit of BluTak so it wouldn't roll down. The lower apple is not another apple but the top one repeated. 

Appleness  Oil on canvas. 41 cm X 30 cm  October 2010


And this one, painted a few years ago in the same spirit of exploration.

Yellow apple in space  Acrylic on wood.  46 cm X 28.5 cm


2 comments:

Ivy said...

Awesome apples, Natalie.

I have this huge golden delicious waiting for me to eat. It's almost the size of that rose in Magritte's painting! ;-)

Natalie said...

Ivy, thanks. The size of my painted one is about five times life-size so that could serve at least five hungry apple-lovers.
To eat, my favourites are Pink Lady. Golden Delicious are ok but a bit bland and soft, no?