WEEK #9 / STILL LIFE WITH APRICOTS AND CHERRIES

Panicale: Still Life with Apricots and Cherries

James Aponovich

oil on paper, 9.5" x 12", 2011

Each year Beth and I go to Italy. We go to Italy to work, draw and study the amazingly rich trove of paintings, sculptures and architecture that abound there. That being said, we also do not ignore the wonderful food, wine and people that make our time in Italy so wonderful.

I am a painter by trade, but I find it difficult to transport all the "stuff" it takes to execute an oil painting there. Flight restrictions, transportation and "wet paint" make it a chore, so I draw , or more precisely I sketch.

Sketchbook pages from Italy

James Aponovich

In April of 2010, prior to our annual trip to Umbria, my good friend Bob, himself a noted artist, gave us a beautiful travel set of watercolors to use on site. We purchased a couple of blocks of watercolor paper and set off to Italy.

While in our favorite town of Panicale, I purchased some fruit from the local greengrocer.

I placed the apricots and cherries on a plate and began to make a mess of it with watercolor, a most difficult medium.

Recently Beth found it in the studio, dusted it off and suggested that I finish it. for this project. No more watercolor for me, I instead sized the paper and painted over it with oils.

A Dish with Cherries and Carnations

Giovanna Garzoni, 1600-1670

Tempera on paper

Palazzo Pitti, Florence

One of my most admired still life painters is Giovanna Garzoni, who was a miniaturist of considerable renown in Rome, Florence and Milan. It was not easy for a woman to break into the trade union of painters. She painted with such clarity and simplicity.

Copyright 2011 James Aponovich

WEEK #8 / TAKE-OUT BOX WITH NOODLES SHRIMP & PEAS

TAKE-OUT BOX WITH NOODLES,SHRIMP & PEAS

James Aponovich

oil on canvas, 18" x 12", 2011

This is a study for a larger overall painting, Chinese Take-out. Most of the time I don't bother doing individual paintings of the larger concept, however,in this case I am dealing with three separate groups of objects; fortune cookies, take-out box and bowl of orange slices. They can all be separate paintings, but can they work together in one painting? Can the sum of the parts be greater than the parts? We will see.

Tonal Study: TAKE-OUT BOX WITH NOODLES,SHRIMP & PEAS

James Aponovich

Graphite on paper, 3.25" x 4.75", 2011

In this sketchbook study the box is drawn directly from life.

The box is drawn in the "correct"

shape (how it looks), but in the painting I have elongated it, making it a bit more elegant perhaps. I never aim to merely copy what I see, rather to have it become a starting point towards a more idealized form. This is what is often referred to as "artistic license", a much overused term.

Linear Compositional Study: CHINESE TAKE-OUT

James Aponovich

Graphite on paper, 5" x 8", 2011

In this drawing I have further developed the composition from an earlier sketch ( see week 6).

This is the classic Golden Section rectangle. It is based on a ratio that remains constant and is infinite.

The famous Fibonacci Series (2,3,5,8,13,21...etc) is based on it. It is the ratio of growth in nature and the most harmonious rectangle...I have always found it to be a little long though.

CHINESE RESTAURANT

Max Weber, 1915

oil on canvas, 40" x 48"

Whitney Museum of American Art

Max Weber's vision of a Chinese restaurant was influenced by the Cubism of Picasso and Braque who were painting in Paris at the time. By far, Cubism was the most profound art movement of the last century. What Einstein was doing in physics, Picasso was doing in painting.

Stove Top Lunch

I should note that I made the noodle dish. The take-out from Lucky Panda did not quite make it! So, this became lunch for Beth and me... after I painted it.

copyright 2011 James Aponovich

WEEK #7 / BOXED FRUIT SERIES: Bowl with Fruit with Flame Orange Tissue

Boxed Fruit Series: Bowl of Fruit with Flame Orange Tissue

James Aponovich

14' x 15", oil on canvas, 2011

THE POWER OF THE CENTER

Of all the formats, a square canvas is the most difficult to compose. Since a circle fits quite nicely within a square there is a tendency to have everything revolve around and focus on the center. In other words it becomes static.

Buddhist Mandala

Here the center is meant to dominate. Everything radiates out from it and condenses back into the center. It is a sacred guide to deep meditation.

My composition is not a square but it is based on a circle. The rectangle is created by six key points on the circle. It's a bit complicated but the rectangle is divided into two central squares and four flanking 'Golden Section' rectangles. It is serious business and is referred to as

The Painter's Secret Geometry. The center of the clementine sits on the center of the rectangle.

THE POWER OF COLOR

Mathias Grunewald (1475-1528)

Resurrection and Transfiguration of Jesus,

from the Isenheim Altarpiece

Grunewald was the original German Expressionist. He did not hold anything back. By the way, the composition is comprised of a square below (soldiers,rocks,etc) and a Golden Section rectangle above. Powerful stuff.

Color is used for full impact. Out of the terrestrial palette of earth tones, Jesus rises with the twisting fabric changing from cool whites into violet and crimson. A flame orange nimbus radiates celestial yellow all set against a ink black sky.

Wow!

WEEK #6 / FORTUNE COOKIES

Study: Chinese Fortune Cookies

James Aponovich

oil on canvas, 4" x 6", 2011

painting # 6

"In order to gain what you cannot loose

You must give up what you can loose."

from a Chinese fortune cookie

THE STORY

Chinese Take-out: The Preliminary Studies

Study for Chinese Take-out

James Aponovich

Graphite on paper, 2" x 3", c. mid 1980's

Some ideas and aspirations never die. This tiny sketch is about twenty five years old, but I continue to be intrigued with the concept. It's not what you paint, but rather how you paint it. Almost everything I paint has had various studies done beforehand.

LInear concept study: Chinese Take-out

James Aponovich

Graphite on paper, 7" x 10", 2011

This sketch shows the central take-out box filled with shrimp, peas, noodles and two chopsticks. On the left is a bowl with orange slices and on the right are fortune cookies spilling out of a box. This rectangle is irregular, known as a 'root two rectangle'. I am considering moving the bowl of oranges further to the left and elongating the rectangle.

Painting # 6 ( as shown at the top)

Chinese Fortune Cookies

J. Aponovich

Who knew that painting cellophane would be so difficult to paint!

I plan to paint (as studies) the three themes: Bowl of Oranges, Take-out Box, and the completed painting for this week, Fortune Cookies.

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Answer to last weeks puzzler : H20...water

Water is uniting theme in the objects in painting # 5 :

(Look back and find these clues.)

H................Hydrogen

O..............Oxygen

NE...........North By East, by Rockwell Kent

Chinese ideogram is Taoist and the quote is from the Tao Teh Ching (chapter 8)

Pattern on cloth represents clouds and rain.

Are there any winners?

Copyright James Aponovich 2011

Painting # 5 / STILL LIFE with STACKED BOOKS

Still Life with Stacked Books

James Aponovich

20 x 16, oil on canvas, 2011

THE THEME SHOW

Late in 2010 Beth and I were asked to submit paintings for a June 2011 exhibition

at Clark Gallery in Lincoln, MA. The theme for this invitational would be books as subject matter. The title for the show is Picture Books and will run from June 7th through the month of July.

I guess the good thing about a book theme is that it narrows the focus to...books. However, painting book titles is like putting bumper sticker on cars; it can broadcast .a lot about you in a few words. But when asked to do something, you try.

My first sketches failed, they were more like illustrations, so I was stuck. Then, during a phone conversation my eyes happened to fall on a bookcase in the studio. There sat a stack of old black books ( Thomas Mann) with an Italian greeting card sitting on top. Bingo, the found assemblage as still life. It was a light bulb moment, although not without pitfalls.

THE GREETING CARD or PLATO'S DILEMMA

Detail: Still Life with Stacked Books, James Aponovich

from

Detail: The Virgin and Child with St. John the Baptist

Sandro Botticelli (1445-1510)

Musee du Louvre

An image of a painting ( by me) of a reproduction of a detail of a painting ( by Botticelli).

Whew! It's enough to make Plato walk around the Agora rubbing his forehead. According to Book X of Plato's Republic, all painting is more or less bogus because all things are a mere reflection or imitation of the "ideal". In other words, all things are once removed from reality. The artist comes along and paints things and therefore is twice removed. I paint a reproduction

( 3 times removed) and I am consequently 4 times removed. No wonder I am confused.

As ever hidden, look at its inner essence

As ever manifest, look at its outer aspects

Lao Tzu

I avoided painting titles on the books but instead painted the letters H, O and NE, along with some decorative gold bindings. One book has a Chinese ideogram, another a compass rose. In front sits the Clementine from Clementine with Tissue (week 4), with the tissue now acting a leaves of paper, the pages we do not see in the books. The cloth is a fragment of a Japanese kimono with a pattern of clouds and rain. The rain is a clue to what theme ties all these elements together. (answer next week)

THE SOURCE

Whatever the theme may be, the composition has, in my mind, a direct relationship to many

15th Century Italian Madonna and Child paintings.

Madonna col Bambino

Fra Filippo Lippi (1406-1469)

Florence, Palazzo Medici Riccardi

The child stands on a parapet, a standard horizontal railing or wall (notice the crude cast shadow from the feet). The composition builds with beautiful surface detail to the insanely sweet embrace and the faces touching, all set in a shallow field of focus, the niche.

By the way, when you are in Florence, it is imperative to visit the Palazzo Medici- Riccardi to see the frescos in the Chapel of The Magi by Benozzo Gozzoli.

It it well worth a visit and then follow it with lunch at Trattoria Sergio Gozzi (aka.Da Sergio),

in the nearby San Lorenzo market.

copyright James Aponovich, 2011

all Aponovich paintings and text are copyright J.Aponovich

Painting #4 / Clementine in Tissue

Clementine with Tissue

James Aponovich

6 " x 8", oil on canvas, 2011

Another in the series of "Black Paintings" ( see below).

Often I am drawn to paint individual fruits, among my favorites are peeled clementines. These fruits are available in December and January, but now due to a prolonged growing season in Morocco and California they are still in our local market.

Although this painting is small, the fruit is life size. I am most comfortable painting objects their actual size. The previous painting, Parrot Tulips in Black Vase, would have normally been a canvas at least twice the size and subsequently I had to struggle with the proportions.

The painting Clementine in Tissue is a study for

Still Life with Stacked Books (next week's painting.....I hope). My wife Elizabeth likened it to a theme of gradual opening and unfolding of layers. I was happy with that comment.

ABOUT THE "BLACK PAINTINGS"

PAINTINGS HAVE MANY COMPONENTS, TWO OF WHICH ARE COLOR AND VALUE. SIMLPY STATED, VALUE IS THE VARIOUS GREYS ONE WOULD GET A IF A COLOR PAINTING WAS PHOTOGRAPHED IN BLACK AND WHITE. I REFER TO THESE AS VALUE CHORDS. GENERALLY THERE ARE THREE BSAIC CHORDS, LOW. HIGH AND INTERMEDIATE.

Low Value (DARK)

VERY DARK VALUES PUNCTUATED WITH WHITE . THIS IS THE VALUE CHORD OF THE

"BLACK PAINTINGS". IT IS DEEP AND MYSTERIOUS. IN A STRING QUARTET IT WOULD BE THE SOUND OF THE CELLO OR VIOLA.

High Value (LIGHT)

MOSTLY LIGHT, AIRY VALUES WITH THE ADDITION OF WHITE AND BLACK DETAILS. THINK OF A RENOIR PAINTING OR THE SOUND OF A VIOLIN IN THE STRING QUARTET.

Intermediate Value ( MID)

HERE ALL THE VALUES ARE BALANCED WITH OVERALL MID VALUE PUNCTUATED WITH WHITE AND BLACK ( light and dark). MOST OF MY PAINTINGS ( Parrot Tulips in Black Vase,for example) ARE IN THIS CHORD.

IT IS THE ENTIRE STRING QUARTET.

PARROT TULIPS in BLACK VASE

Parrot Tulips in Black Vase

Aponovich, 2011

oil on canvas, 16 x 12

(painting no.3)

This painting is an example of one of my Italian based still lifes. It contains the recurring theme of flowers, objects and fabric set into an Italian landscape. It is hard to beat the Italian landscape for visual interest. Originally my still lifes were all set against a neutral white wall. They were getting tired and I was getting bored. I gradually fell into a deep creative slump. It was at this time I was commissioned to travel to Italy to do a painting. I don't remember what I painted but I do recall finding myself in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence looking at a painting of a guy with a strange nose.

Portrait of Federico da Montefeltro

Duke of Urbino, 1465

Piero della Francesca

oil on panel, 18 x 13

I was transfixed by the simple profile portrait set in what seemed to be an imaginary Italian landscape, pretty much the same landscape that I had just stepped out of. Visually, in many ways, Italy has not changed much in 500 years. It was the clarity of the atmosphere that struck me. Piero was painting the actual air. I realized that in order for me to paint any object I must

also paint the air in front, around and behind, in other words the atmosphere, what the Italians call"sfumato".

I returned to the studio and began to introduce the landscape (Italian) into my compositions.

However, I would find that this transformation comes with it's own limitations. More on that later.

Copyright James Aponovich 2011

All Aponovich images and content copyright of J.Aponovich