APONOVICH 52

WEEK # 48 / CHAMBERED NAUTILUS

2012-02-21T06:43:00.000-08:00

Chambered Nautilus

James Aponovich

oil on panel , 6" x 6", 2012

This is a study for a larger, upcoming painting. The shell has been sitting on a shelf in the studio for years and since I normally do not paint seashells, I never paid much attention to it. A few days ago, I took it down off the shelf and really examined it. I must paint this.

The Romanian sculptor Brancusi once said that the egg was the ideal shape (see week # 31). That may be true, but I feel that this shell may be the most beautiful shape. It's asymmetrical form is exquisite, the very embodiment of natural elegance and grace. As a realist, I paint the external surface of objects, but it is how they are composed internally that has always interested me. The shape of this shell is a result of an uneven growth sequence...a very precise uneven growth sequence.

A VERY PRECISE GROWTH SEQUENCE

Rectangle of the Whirling Squares

with Logarithmic Spiral

Rectangle of the Whirling Squares! Who says this stuff is boring?

Well, It's just another name for the good old Golden Section Rectangle that I have referred to in the past. But if you look at it, you will see that it is composed of squares, one after another, getting progressively smaller and smaller, dancing their way around....ad infinitum. Start adding squares and it gets larger and larger....it never ends. Progressive growth - same shape.

By drawing diagonals in all the squares and inscribing arcs I come up with a logarithmic spiral, or growth pattern for the chambered nautilus.

WOW!

All content is copyright James Aponovich and cannot be used or reproduced with express written permission.

WEEK # 47 / Still Life with Self Portrait

2012-02-17T07:38:00.000-08:00

Still Life with Self Portrait

James Aponovich

oil on panel, 10" x 8", 2012

"I never was good looking

now I'm too old to let that get me down"

Chris Smither, singer songwriter

It had to happen, sooner or later I would have to face reality and deal with the self portrait. The last one I did was perhaps twenty five years ago. Good reason. This painting started as a farewell to the clementine orange, that little jewel from Spain and North Africa. They are now being replaced by an impostor from California appropriately called "cuties". A sales pitch.

Anyway, I decided to include a portrait of me impaled on a 'frog', a barbed florist stand ment to stick flower stems onto. I keep one next to my easel with a reproduction

of a painting, A Portrait of a Man by Hans Memling. I did not want to copy Memling so I painted a reproduction of another man....me.

THE CULT OF SELF

"......repurposed material folded into larger questions of identity, history, culture and the cult of self."

This is a portion of a review of an artist's show that was published in The New York Time last year. Cult of self? I called my art savvy Boston dealer, Dana Salvo, and asked him to translate that sentence from 'artspeak' to English. He told me not to worry about it.

Rembrandt

The Artist In His Studio

oil on panel, 10" x 12", 1628

Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

REMBRANDT

I am often asked which artist is my favorite. That is a difficult question to answer but I would come down on the side of Rembrandt. His humanity, piety and outstanding technical ability puts him on top. I have chosen two self portraits out of the hundreds that he did in his life. Both are in relatively close proximity to me, one in Boston, the other in New York. This small painting shows Rembrandt at the age of twenty two in the full act of painting. He has stepped back from the easel and like a swordsman is about to lunge forward and attack that painting with his brush. His future all before him.

Rembrandt

Self Portrait

oil on canvas, 52" x 40", 1658

The Frick Collection, NY

Here sits the Master some thirty years later. He is fifty two and has just lost everything he acquired from his illustrious career. His house and belongings were sold to pay off his debts. He is broke, out of work, and out of fashion. Yet, he says to himself, screw it! I am a painter. So he paints one of the greatest portraits of all time. He is a King and portrays himself accordingly, the black eyes stare at you with the accumulated wisdom of triumph and tragedy. He died at my current age, broke.

Sixteen years later in Germany a child is born who was to bring to music what Rembrandt to painting......Johann Sebastian Bach.

WEEK # 46 / Moonrise Over the Gulf of Maine

2012-02-10T15:14:00.000-08:00

Moonrise Over the Gulf of Maine

James Aponovich

oil on canvas, 10" x 13", 2012

I am very fortunate to live relatively close to the seacoast. Sometimes, particularly in winter I feel the need to wash my eyes clean with the blue of the sea and sky. I have written before about painting on the coast of Maine but now Beth and I are in New Castle, New Hampshire, just east of Portsmouth. ( click on: Aponovich and Johansson, At Home and Away )

We habitually sketch, not always to create art but to train our eyes, minds and hands to, as Beth puts it "organize space". That is the primary role of composition. Be mindful however, that we are always on the lookout for that situation where everything comes together....

...it's right in front of you.

Sketch, Moonrise

James Aponovich

Pencil on paper, 4.5" x 6", 2012

BASIC ELEMENTS

After a long day of looking at drawing sites in Southern Maine, we returned to New Castle and there it was, an outcropping of granite and basalt at high tide. Come two hours later and it completely changed. But for now, for me, this was as basic as it gets. Rock, both in the sea as granite and in the sky as the moon, and water, the sea and clouds. The rocks were leviathan like emerging from a primordial sea. This was earth for billions of years.

The sketch probably took me about twenty minutes to do, but it was enough information. The sea was an electric blue, ice cold, not a Mediterranean sapphire. The rocks were wet and black but the last fading rays of the sunset barely cast a warm light on the very top. The rocks were the fulcrum of sun and moon. The moment was out of time. This is why we always return to the coast, the rhythm of the tide and the screech of the gull is embedded in us.

Coming up next week: Let Me Introduce Myself

All content copyright James Aponovich and cannot be used without permission

WEEK # 45/ Roadside Pansies

2012-02-04T08:13:00.000-08:00

Roadside Pansies

James Aponovich

oil on canvas, 14" x 14", 2012

FULL DISCLOSURE

Today is February 5th, the first Sunday of the month. About two months ago we decided to host a dinner party for friends of ours from New York who are returning ( they being "summer folk" here) to their Hancock home for a world premier. You see, Robert O., formerly a writer for Jim Henson's Sesame Street, now retired , has taken up the pen and scripted the lyrics to an operetta totally based on the local police log, aptly titled "Police Log".

A month ago it occurred to me that this day could be what is now an unofficial National holiday called Super Bowl Sunday, and the fact that New England and New York are combatants, it's a huge day around here. I say, fare forward fans for I declare this day the Super "O" Bowl in honor of our guests the Oksners! So, I am busy in the kitchen.

OH YEAH.........THE PAINTING

Seeing that New England is in the Northeastern corner of this hemisphere, winter comes early and leaves late. The joke is that there are a couple of months out of the year when the skiing is not too good. That means we are always on the look out for signs of Spring.

I was searching for a particular plant for the great "Appledore" painting, that is on my easel. We stopped into a sprawling roadside plant place , it holds the distinction for being open 365 days a year and for having free popcorn. What's not to like. As we pulled in there were racks of pansies outside....in January! I couldn't find what I was looking for, but upon returning home I kept thinking of those pansies. The next day I returned and also discovered, amongst the garden stuff, the Chinese porcelain balls. I could not wait to start the painting. The point is you never know where a painting will pop up, so keep your eyes open, it could be right in front of you.

WEEK #44 / Still Life with French Porcelain Hand

2012-01-27T12:19:00.000-08:00

Still Life with French Porcelain Hand

James Aponovich

oil on panel, 10" x 8", 2012

"KINDA CREEPY"

At Christmas, one of the presents that we gave to our daughter Ana was, of course, a gift certificate to some place or other. While shopping, I discovered this porcelain hand at an antique shop and thought it would be clever to place the certificate in the hand. Bad idea. Her reaction to the hand was that it was "kinda creepy". She kept the gift card and returned the hand, thank you very much. O.K., I thought, maybe I'll find a use for it, then I found a discarded postage stamp sheet picked clean of stamps. Hmmmm.

MINIMALISM and the FOUND OBJECT

The grid on the stamp sheet impressed me with it's clean lines,both straight and revealing a perforated border. It had a cool whiteness. The Minimalist painter Agnes Martin immediately came to mind.

Agnes Martin

acrylic on canvas, 1997

Minimalism, as an art form, carries a complete economy of means. Nothing is superficial. I, on the other hand, am a Representational painter so it is difficult not to tell stories, whether you want to or not. With Minimalism it is almost impossible to "read into" a painting, even the Abstract Expressionists could not avoid that.

THE HAND

Along with the eye, the human hand is loaded with symbolism. In the position of the porcelain it can mean STOP! or peace. The "Hand of God" was portrayed by artists in the Middle Ages as a hand in the sky. In Buddhism the hand of Buddha with fingers out stretched would symbolize the turning of the Wheel of Dharma. In almost every city, for ten bucks you can have someone read your past and tell your future by looking at your hand.

Bronze Hand

Yemen, 100-300 AD.

British Museum

This Arabian hand was an offering to God, or more precisely, a god. It stood in for the real thing. To lay your hand down to God was a serious business.

THE ASSEMBLAGE

Joseph Cornell

Hotel de la Duchesse-Anne, 1957

The master of the found object was Joseph Cornell who led a very private, pedestrian life in Queens, New York, yet produced the most amazing visual poetry from random objects.

MY JOSEPH CORNELL MOMENT

My first New York art dealer was Allan Stone. One day he had me visit him at his home just outside the city. I had never seen so much art stuffed into one house before, DeKoonings all over the place, a major Franz Kline painting behind not over the sofa! So much art that there were only narrow paths leading through the rooms. Of course I was awestruck and slack jawed and as I was walking and looking, I nearly kicked a box that was on the floor....

a Joseph Cornell box!

This painting is my homage to Joseph Cornell.

WEEK # 43 / The White Sofa

2012-01-21T08:59:00.000-08:00

The White Sofa

James Aponovich

oil on canvas, 14" x 16", 2012

"AND NOW FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY DIFFERENT "

Monty Python's Flying Circus

Due to a lifting of a deadline and accumulating snow outside, I am finding myself in need of a getaway. The problem is that I am still "chained to the easel" until this project is finished, so artistically anyway, I am going to Rome.

Beth and I share adjoining studios and by chance we are both working from drawings we did on our last trip to Rome.

The White Sofa

James Aponovich

pencil on Arches paper, 9.5" x 10.5", 2010

Hanging in our kitchen is a drawing I did a couple of years ago when I was a Visiting Artist at The American Academy in Rome. The Academy is housed in a magnificent group of buildings on the Gianicolo Hill overlooking Trastevere and the rest of Rome. The views are stunning. This drawing is of the interior of our apartment "Il Cortile", the courtyard, in the McKim, Mead and White building. It indeed overlooks the main courtyard with huge cypresses and a Paul Manship fountain. The rooms are brilliant white with deep Florentine Red tile floors. This sofa is in the living room and is the first thing you see as you enter.

Interior of Cortile apartment

Usually, Beth and I would start our day downstairs at the Bar/Cafe for a cappuccino and cornetto while trying to catch up on world news and baseball scores back home. As many places are closed during mid day we would spend our mornings walking down into Rome to visit galleries, churches,ruins, markets,restaurants and just about everything else we could absorb.

In Umbria we draw everyday. Here we looked and looked. Late in the afternoon I would draw for a few hours. Don't ask me why, but I was fascinated by this sofa. Technically it's an interior but I just view it as a big still life.

Courtyard

I really treasured my time at The Academy. I felt quite at home there, it's more like a monastery with writers, architects, historians, musicians and, oh yeah, artists concentrating on their work. The quiet beauty is intoxicating and I look forward to returning.

WEEK # 42 / Tulips in a Bronze Vase

2012-01-13T10:36:00.000-08:00

Tulips in a Bronze Vase

James Aponovich

Oil on panel, 7" x 5", 2012

The central theme of the new, large painting that I am working on, now titled

Appledore Still Life , Incoming Fog, is a blue cloisonne vas loaded with heavy parrot tulips.This painting , Tulips in a Bronze Vase, is a study for that painting. It now has a life of it's own.

THE WEIGHT OF WATER

The flowers are in a bronze vase that I recently found in an antique shop. I love the surface and the historical significance of bronze, an ancient alloy of tin and copper. In portraying the tulips I am aiming to accentuate their physical appearance, how gravity presses them one onto another.

Each flower is delicate and fragile, their petals tear easily. The metal vase is heavy, cold and hard, the ultimate contrast. The background is dark, the flowers burning embers. For a small painting it is very, very heavy.

2012 copyright James Aponovich

All content, text and images copyright James Aponovich and cannot be used without permission.

Week #41 / Tidal Pool

2012-01-08T09:30:00.000-08:00

Tidal Pool

James Aponovich

Oil on canvas, 8" x 12", 2012

When I paint on site I use very few materials. It begins with a pencil drawing, fairly detailed, on canvas, followed by oil washes that are transparent and gradually built up.The technique is basically what is known as grisaille, a monochromatic painting.

This is an oil sketch painted with sepia and indigo blue. Sepia originally was derived from the ink sack of the cuttlefish, so it seems fitting to use it on this edge of the land, beginning of the seascape painting. This is a study for the "great Appledore" painting and it represents the core theme of this piece, the juxtaposition of rock and sea with the lush vitality of flowers and fruit. It is a thematic polarity. There is no debris, no flotsam, no jetsam, a pure primordial world.

I have painted this to set the stage for the environment: rock,sea,and sky. I am becoming more and more absorbed into the painting. It is a necessary condition.

All content and Aponovich images are copyright and cannot be used

without permission.

WEEK #40 / Glass Fishing Buoy

2011-12-31T14:27:00.000-08:00

Glass Fishing Buoy

James Aponovich

oil on panel, 5" x 7", 2011

A CHANGE OF VENUE

Recently I was asked to be member of a major New York art gallery, Hirschl & Adler Modern. It is a big deal.

Hirschl and Adler Gallery is taking part in the annual NY Armory Show which opens on March 7. They have requested from me a new and large American based painting for this exhibition. Wow! New and large. I am up for it , but it will be challenging to find enough day light hours to complete this new piece and still post a new painting each week for the blog.

The gallery ( Hirschl & Adler Modern) is supportive of my efforts in completing this blog project and the planned June show of the 52 paintings at Clark Gallery. But it is important to me that I am getting work to them as well.

Do I give up the Aponovich 52 and concentrate on the new painting?

Do I finish this blog project risking not completing the large piece?

As usual, Beth had an idea for a sensible solution......paint the large piece and paint studies to post each week that document the process. So please bear with me as I combine both.

THE APPLEDORE PAINTING

James Aponovich

Detail: Appledore Still Life

The new painting is set on Appledore Island, part of the Isles of Shoals off the coasts of New Hampshire and Maine. I cannot show a preliminary sketch because I do not have one...it is all in my head. At this point everything is fairly malleable, but here you can see that the fishing buoy is fully drawn. Above it, taped to the canvas, is a sketch of a tidal pool which will define part of the land/ seascape.

So,stay tuned......remember I told you it was going to be a bumpy ride!

Week #39 / Three Mandarin Oranges

2011-12-24T12:14:00.001-08:00

Three Mandarin Oranges

James Aponovich

oil on panel. 10" x 8", 2011

Right now it's Christmas Eve. I just finished the painting. Family is arriving through the door, dogs are barking and my services are required in the kitchen.

Happy Holidays

WELCOME YULE !

WEEK 38/ A Bunch of Radishes

2011-12-18T09:50:00.000-08:00

A Bunch of Radishes

James Aponovich

Oil on canvas, 9" x 9", 2011

GETTING EDGY AND TENSE

I have written about the power of the center ( week #7). In this painting of radishes I am interested in the tension that the sides of the composition exert on the subject matter. In other words, how to build tension. These radishes are more or less life size and if they were part of a larger grouping of objects they would appear small. By bring the sides of the canvas close to the tissue a certain tension is created and it gives the radishes a larger and more significant scale.

Francisco de Zurbaran (1598-1664)

Quinces

oil on canvas, 14" x 16"

Museo D'art, Barcelona

Here the tension is carried to an extreme as the edge of the canvas actually crops the top of the quince. The composition gives the fruit a monumentality which is almost suffocating. I wonder if it is a fragment of a larger painting.

Jean-Etienne Liotard (1702-1789)

Basket of Apples

Pastel on vellum, 14" x 18"

Liotard has given his subject matter more breathing room. It results in a more serene and in my opinion a slightly more boring picture.

"I GOT RHYTHM"

Ira Gershwin

Next to my easel I have a piece of paper where I have written the eight Platonic Requirements for Art. They have become my daily mantra. The last one is rhythm. Visual rhythm is energy, movement and sequencing . I have tried to make the radishes and the surrounding tissue visually rotate. At the same time, although the format is square, there is an upward building of form which gives the appearance of a more vertical composition, kind of like a Dutch windmill.

WEEK 37 / Daylilies in a Canton Bowl

2011-12-11T07:52:00.000-08:00

Daylilies in a Canton Bowl

James Aponovich

Oil on canvas, 13" x 17", 2011

This painting began as a presentation piece for a larger commissioned painting,. the central theme is a bowl full of flowers. I gave the patron three different flower possibilities: tulips, daylilies and peonies. She ended up choosing peonies ( the most difficult). Anyway, the study was lying around the studio so, as I am apt to do, I decided to paint an Italian landscape from my sketchbook.

ON THE ROAD TO ANGHIARI

The landscape is situated in Eastern Tuscany between Arezzo and Borgo San Sepolcro, near Anghiari. Anghiari is significant for two reasons: it is home to the Busatti fabric mill

(the cloth in the painting is Busatti) and it was the site of a famous Renaissance battle between the Florentines and the Milanese. Leonardo DaVinci painted The Battle of Anghiari and some scholars think the painting is located in the Palazzo Vecchio in Florence ( they won the battle).

It may be behind a fresco by by the mediocre painter / great biographer Giorgio Vasari. Next time you are in the Uffizi, he was the architect.

It is an interesting controversy so stay tuned.

THE PIERO TRAIL

Piero Della Francesca

The Resurrection, 1463

Palazzo Comunale

Borgo San Sepolcro, Italy

Fresco

"The best picture in the world."

Aldous Huxley

Every summer thousands of tourists pursue what is called "The Piero della Francesca Trail".

In a single day they leave their rented villas in Chianti and drive successively to Arezzo, Monterchi, Borgo San Sepolcro, and if they still have stamina, Urbino. All the masterpieces in one day. Then they can say the have "done" the Piero Trail........please.

Beth and I did go to San Sepolcro to see this fresco. This was Piero's home town. We stayed in a charming hotel which had a pretty good restaurant and we experienced what the Italians call una passeggiata, an evening stroll. We never made it to Urbino, but I did find this fabric and as we always say," un' altra volta."

WEEK 36 / Malted Milk Balls

2011-12-02T08:23:00.000-08:00

Malted Milk Balls

James Aponovich

oil on canvas, 11" x 9", 2011

ODE TO COMMON THINGS

Recently Beth and I were in a small antique shop in our neighboring town. It is a very sweet place with old linens, plates, silver and every sort of bric a brac . I was asked why I do not paint some of the objects that I was admiring there in the shop. I thought for a minute and replied;

"These things are too nice."

That is to say, they didn't need transformation. Although very tastefully attractive they would have not been very interesting on canvas. A poem by Pablo Neruda came to mind. It's a poem about a French fried potato:

FRENCH

FRIES

INTO THE PAN

LIKE THE MORNING SWAN'S

SNOWY

FEATHERS

AND EMERGE

HALF-GOLDEN FROM THE OLIVE'S

CRACKLING AMBER...

ODE TO FRENCH FRIES

Pablo Neruda

French Fries! So,having cleaned the studio out for Thanksgiving dinner I found this bag of malted milk balls long forgotten on a shelf. Although old they still retained a glossy, rich surface. At the same time I was writing an appointment into the calendar and noticed a painting by Egon Shiele.

Egon Shiele

Portrait of Gerti Shiele, 1909

55" x 55", oil and stuff on canvas

The Museum of Modern Art, New York

Egon Shiele was an Austrian artist who briefly flourished during Vienna's Belle Epoque period. He died during the Great Influenza epidemic of 1919 at the age of 28.

You take your influences wherever you find them.

There is a saying that people who have died still live in the memories of those who loved them. Perhaps. Sometimes when I look at an old painting it seems so alive to me that I can almost touch the artist.

WEEK 35 / A Small Basket of Strawberries

2011-11-27T10:45:00.000-08:00

A Small Basket of Strawberries

James Aponovich

oil on canvas, 8" x 10", 2011

It is now holiday season and time is getting tight. For me, this is as simple as it gets, a basket of strawberries composed within a triangle, smack in the middle with a horizontal line of Italian pine trees and the distant buildings.

Compositional Study: A Small Basket of Strawberries

Or so it seems. Actually the still life is slightly shifted to the left, the vertical axis resting on the Golden Section. In other words, it's dynamically askew.

WEEK 34 / Papers on a Chalk Board

2011-11-20T14:31:00.000-08:00

Papers on a Chalk Board

James Aponovich

oil on panel, 11.5 " x 8.5", 2011

FIBONACCI'S PUZZLE

This painting confused me. It began as a straight forward study of cards, papers and the ever present "Classical" reproduction. Essentially it was meant to be a practice piece ( along with week 30) for a series of trompe l'oeil panels. Everything in the composition is a bit askew except for the still life reproduction that is centered and parallel to the sides, aka. in the middle....

an art school no no.

As I was working with the composition I kept thinking of the early Soviet / Russian artist Casimir Malevich and the Swiss Dada artist Kurt Schwitters. Remember, remove the imagery and you have simple shapes.

But I do use imagery and usually I would have placed a reproduction of a Filippino Lippi or a Botticelli in the center. I instead painted an Aponovich still life of tulips. The problem I encountered was when I was painting the playing card or the parking garage stub I was simply coping the surface, two dimensional to two dimensional. It all rested on the surface plane of the panel, however, when I started painting my own still life I began painting into the panel, extending depth. It was very unsettling, like being a bit sea sick.

It brought to my mind an old Chinese story that goes something like this:

Chuang - Tzu awoke one morning and said that he had a dream that he was a butterfly....

or was he a butterfly dreaming that he was Chuang - Tzu ?

PS. The Fibonacci Series is in this painting, can you find it?

WEEK # 33 / MOUNT MONADNOCK

2011-11-13T08:08:00.000-08:00

Mount Monadnock

James Aponovich

oil on canvas, 14" x 28", 2011

" THE MOUNTAIN THAT STANDS ALONE "

Mount Monadnock, in the Southwest corner of New Hampshire, is literally one tough rock to paint. We live here. At the turn of the Nineteenth Century, Mount Monadnock was the focal point of the Dublin Art Colony. Artists such as Abbott Thayer and Rockwell Kent painted here and Samuel Clemens ( Mark Twain) summered in Dublin, New Hampshire.

Now, it is late atumn, the maples have shed their crimson leaves leaving the magnificent oaks and beeches to show off their splendor. It is one of my favorite times of year, no bugs and clean air.

Study, Mount Monadnock

James Aponovich

Pencil on paper, 3" x 5"

I am always searching out the best view of the mountain. It is difficult for as the Abenaki name infers it stands as a solitary form, one big pyramid. One day I was driving past a small lake and saw rocks exposed against a far shore of sun drenched oaks. It must be low tide I thought, (having lived on the Maine coast, it's natural). No, they are lowing the level of the lake. My friend the author Howard Mansfield explains why in his most recent book, Turn and Jump. I drew this sketch on sight and proceeded to paint the canvas in the studio.

George Inness

The Red Oaks

oil on canvas, 36" x 54", 1894

Santa Barbara Museum of Art

Inness painted this scene when he was seventy years old. Here's to great talents ripening late! Oaks don't get this red. When his son, George Inness, Jr., was asked about this painting he said: " Was it done from nature?....no....it could not be. It was done from art."

WEEK #32 / The Saco River at Conway, New Hampshire

2011-11-04T11:27:00.000-07:00

The Saco River at Conway, NH

James Aponovich

oil on canvas, 18" x 24", 2011

The White Mountains of New Hampshire were the original source of inspiration for American painters during the early 19th Century. They sought a visionary Eden here in the wilderness. It was all new and unspoiled. What was new quickly grew old. When The West was opened the painters ( along with the farmers) left New Hampshire for more opulent vistas.

This view of the Saco River Valley is named after one of those painters, Frank Shapleigh. Mount Washington is dominate in the distance.

George Inness

The Lackawanna Valley

oil on canvas, 34" x 50", 1855

Inness was commissioned by the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad to commemorate the new Roundhouse complex at Scranton, Pennsylvania. Here the instrument of progress is the locomotive and the landscape opened, trees felled and tracks laid. The West was opening.

Both Inness and myself sketched on site. The sketches were then brought to the studio where the actual painters were created.

WEEK #31/ Eggs in a Wire Basket

2011-10-28T07:26:00.000-07:00

Eggs in a Wire Basket

James Aponovich

Oil on canvas, 10" x 10", 2011

The Romanian sculptor Constantin Brancusi once called the egg the "ideal"form. There is much truth in that statement. The absolute simplicity of the egg form demands the utmost from the artist in order to capture it's gradations of value, but also the fact that there is no visible edge. It just keeps on turning. So, not only does the artist have to deal with light, highlight, shadow, core shadow and reflective light, but also to modify the transition of edge to the surrounding value. That's a lot of technical talk that boils down to the fact that if you can paint an egg, you can paint a lot of things.

Rogier Van Der Weyden (1400-1464)

Portrait of a Lady

0il on panel, 14 " x 11"

National Gallery, Washington, DC

Here the head of the lady conforms to the shape of an inverted egg. There is an extreme refinement and subtlety of value in the articulation of the eyes, nose and mouth, all within the general shape of the face. By framing the head with a starched white headdress the artist avoids having the central values of the face absorbed into the black background. The resulting graphic contrast is amazing.

THE ACCIDENTAL STILL LIFE

Jacques-Louis David

Lictors Bringing to Brutus the Bodies of His Sons,1781

Detail of a Sewing Basket

David was active during the French Revolution and Napolean's rise to power. At that time still life painting was not "true" painting but only a training exercise. High art dealt with the human figure usually set in a classical context. Historical subject matter supported the Neo-Classical principals of the age. Here, amongst the intense and tragic drama,David finds relief in a small sewing basket. We will have to wait for the French painters culminating with Cezanne to fully liberate the still life.

WEEK #30 / Four Maple Leaves Taped To a Wall

2011-10-21T10:58:00.000-07:00

Four Maple Leaves Taped to a Wall

James Aponovich

oil on panel, 10" x 8", 2011

THE ILLUSION OF REALITY

THE REALITY OF ILLUSION

This painting is a concept study for an inset panel in a commissioned piece of furniture. It will ultimately be painted on an oval and bet set into the pediment of the White Mountain Breakfront, a collaboration with the New Hampshire Furniture Master, David Lamb. (see week #16)

The leaves have a symbolic meaning known only to the patron. I wanted these leaves to appear as real as I could so one would think that they are actually attached to the piece of furniture. I went to a style of painting that the French call Trompe-l'oeil, fool the eye.

REALISM

Realism is the rendering of textural qualities of an object according to formal Western artistic concepts, such as value modeling (chiaroscuro). An essential factor in obtaining the illusion of reality is conveying a credible sense of space. When objects are painted in this space the tactile surface of the picture disappears and the painting becomes it's own world. It becomes an illusionistic piece.

RULES OF ENGAGEMENT

There is a tacit agreement between the viewer and the painting that acknowledges that it is a fictive world. To enter this pictured world is an act of volition by the viewer and one is led by the realism of details and the construction of space to accept ( or not) the illusion of reality. To put it another way, when we attend the movies, we know it is not real but we allow ourselves to be absorbed as if it were real. We have a visual dialogue.

In Trompe l'oeil there is none of this. That is to say the main purpose of most "trompe" paintings is to immediately convince you that it is real, not a painting. If you have to feel the surface to determine that yes, it is a painting then the artist wins! It's a hoax. This is why the "trompe" style is frowned upon by critics, it is entertainment.

The problem for me comes in when I realize how difficult it is to paint in this style. I have to bring all my experience and knowledge to carry it across and still I fall short. It's really hard!

William Harnett

The Faithful Colt

oil on canvas, 22" x 28", 1890

My fascination with all this began when I was standing in front of this painting by the American painter William Harnett. I knew that painting a gun on a barn wall was kind of trite but I experienced something quite unique, my eyes felt good looking at the surface! There was a definite sense of physical joy in just observing the details.

William Harnett

Mr. Hurlings Rack Picture

oil on canvas, 30" x 25", 1888

Harnett is the acknowledged master of this form of still life. There is a shallow depth of field and an "over the top" rendering of detail. There is more. This piece has an abstraction and visual energy that predates the great art movements of the 20th Century. It is well worth a look.

Fool me once, shame on you,

Fool me twice, shame on me.

WEEK # 29 / Three Pears in a Glass Bowl, The Garfagnana

2011-10-14T07:45:00.000-07:00

Three Pears in a Glass Bowl, The Garfagnana

James Aponovich

Oil on canvas, 15" x 12", 2011

Last week I came across an old pencil sketch I drew many years ago during our first visit to Italy. Beth tells me it was 1994, the location was Barga, Tuscany. It would be a decade before we would return to Italy.

Study, Three Pears in a Glass Bowl

James Aponovich

Pencil on paper, 3.5" x 3", 1994

The sketch is simple, three pears, a bowl, cloth and landscape. For the painting I added a crown of leaves, elevating the composition. I have written about the difficulty of working with the primary color triad of red, yellow and blue. The secondary triad of green, orange and violet is for me is the easiest and most pleasing combination due to the fact they are admixture of the primaries. They are subdued and tend to harmonize and be non confrontational. The leaves and landscape are green, the pears orange and the cloth and sky are violet (?)

WHITE

In this weeks painting the white stands in for violet. Why?

Analysis of a white sky

Optically, white is composed of all the colors of the spectrum. Physically, to arrive at white, I first mix tints of yellow, red and blue, plus two browns ( top row).

By careful blending, and I mean careful, I mix a neutral grey. When I add white to this grey I can attain values from lightest to darkest (middle row). In the painting the sky is lightest by the horizon and has a total of six values, each progressively darker.

The bottom row illustrates the extremes of the lightest ( horizon) to the darkest ( top of sky). This system of mixing grey also means the color can be warmer (more yellow)

or cooler (more blue).

The Garfagnana

Barga, The Garfagnana, Tuscany

Away from the splendid aridness of the Crete, far from the rolling lush hills of Chianti and above the bustle of Florence and Siena sits the beautiful town of Lucca, a short drive from Pisa and the seacoast. Most tourists that visit Lucca marvel at the wonders of this walled city, dine on the famous Pollo Mattone "chicken cooked under a brick" at Giulio's, buy a bag of the ancient grain farro and then depart, going back to the more familiar safety of their Tuscany.

If you travel further, beyond Lucca, up the valley of the Serchio River, past the Devil's Bridge and up, ascending via a totally crazy winding road to the Medieval town of Barga, you will be rewarded. Barga stands at the gateway to the Garfagnana region of the towering Apennine Alps. The landscape is spectacular.

Barga was our artistic home during the first stay in Italy. It was here, while visiting the home of the National Poet, Giovanni Pascoli, at the Castlevecchio Pascoli that I drew this little sketch. Recently we were talking about Barga and waxing romantic thinking of our time there. When this project is complete, we hope to go back to the Garfagnana, so this painting is my own "painterly paean" to that wild Tuscan land.

WEEK 28 / SUNRISE, LITTLE HARBOR, New Castle, NH

2011-10-08T10:59:00.000-07:00

Sunrise, Little Harbor, New Castle, NH

James Aponovich

oil on canvas, 12" x 30", 1999 -2011

Landscape painting is not as easy as it might seem. Rarely does nature just line up perfectly to give you a great "picture". Most of the time things are manipulated by the artist, mountains moved may be referred to artistic license.

I wanted to paint the sun rising over the Isles of Shoals, eight miles east of the New Hampshire coast. I was attracted by Little Harbor, enclosed by a pair of jetties. However, due to the Shoreline Protections Act, trees within seventy five feet of the shore cannot be cut down.

I had originally painted this scene with trees ringing the harbor, but just like anyone that builds a house next to the ocean, I wanted a clear "view". So, I returned and painted most of the trees out.

TIDE'S IN - TIDE'S OUT

Fitz Henry Lane

Brace's Rock

oil on canvas, 10" x 15", 1864

With the trees now gone, I needed visual drama. For inspiration I went to one of my favorite seascape painters, Fitz Henry Lane of Gloucester, Massachusetts fame. I have mentioned him before when I was painting in Blue Hill, Maine ( week #17). He painted a number of versions of Brace's Rock, off Cape Ann (Massachusetts), always with the wreck of some ship. I was interested in the dark rocks silhouetted against the calm harbor. For my painting I waited until low tide so that the rocks would be exposed and the shore line defined by seaweed. To add a human element I added a sailboat catching the first light and breeze of the morning.

Week 27 /Nasturtiums and Cherries, Sebasco, Maine

2011-09-30T14:27:00.001-07:00

Nasturtiums and Cherries, Sebasco, Maine

James Aponovich

Oil on canvas, 16" x 11", 2011

This painting originated in Maine and was completed in New Hampshire. I had brought a few meager nasturtiums from our garden and hoped to complete some sort of still life once we were on the Maine coast. I had managed to paint a couple of flowers when the fog dropped, the next day the flowers were totally wilted. However I did paint the seascape in situ ( on site). I figured that the painting would have to wait until next year when when a new crop of nasturtiums would arrive. To make a long story short, when we returned home we still had loads of nasturtiums growing, so I set to work.

REPETITION OF FORM OR FOLLOW THE BOUNCING BALL

There are many aspects of pictorial composition, dominate verticals, horizontals,diagonals, symmetry,...etc. Fortunately one of the most enjoyable aspects is the use of a repeating element and/ or color.

This painting can be viewed as a flat 2-Dimensional surface. Divided into three layers: the upper with flowers, the middle with the vase and fruit, and the lower with the cloth.

Since the vase contains circles as part of its decoration, I repeated the circle with the round leaves of the nasturtiums. I selected cherries to continue the rhythm on the cloth and " dropped" a few down into the folds. So the circle becomes a melody that punctuates the painting in both form and color.

Still Life with Tulips and Amaryllis

James Aponovich

oil on canvas

This painting Still Life with Tulips and Amaryllis, is another example, using some of the same elements of repeating form. Here the vertical stems of the flowers create their own rhythm that works with the circular tumble below.

WEEK 26 ....HALFTIME.....The Last Daylily of Summer

2011-09-23T08:09:00.000-07:00

The Last Daylily of Summer

James Aponovich

oil on canvas, 8" x 10", 2011

Today is the Autumnal Equinox, the first day of fall and the mid point of this year long project. For gardeners, this is a time of mixed emotions. On the one hand there is sadness at the waning garden with everything withering and turning brown.......daily remorse. On the other hand there is ( for me at least) a certain relief in that it is over, at least for another season.

It is time to concentrate, to return full time to the studio and prepare mentally and physically for the on coming winter in New England. Last week I spotted a lone surviving daylily,' Hyperion' I guess, so since I have not painted my yearly daylily painting I decided to honor it with one last study. Of course, it turns out to be the most vivid lemon yellow imaginable. As I noted before,(week # 22) yellow is the most irascible and difficult color to work with. Value wise this is a very high pitched painting for me. You see, yellow is the next step down from white and whereas a background of black will make yellow really glow, surrounding it with white will mitigate yellow's natural intensity. I chose a transparent glass to enhance this effect. I wanted to use a dark element but found it very difficult to balance. If this painting were a musical instrument, I think it would have to be a Baroque trumpet.

Two Examples of "Daylily" paintings that I have painted in past years:

Three Pots of Daylilies

James Aponovich

Oil on canvas

Daylilies come in endless variations of size, color and leaf shape. In this painting I was as excited by the foliage as I was the flowers,

so I painted the potted plants prior to planting....period.

Still Life with Daylilies and Primula

James Aponovich

oil on canvas

This is a significant still life with daylilies. I will return to it the upcoming weeks.

WEEK 25 / The Pine Tree, Sebasco, Maine

2011-09-16T13:53:00.000-07:00

The Pine Tree, Sebasco, Maine

James Aponovich

Oil on canvas, 8" x 13", 2011

PAINTING IN A CLOUD

Here we are on the Maine Coast again. This time we are in mid-coast, just east of Casco Bay, staying at the house of friends. The coast here is different, long fingers of land stretching down surrounded by the sea with a myriad of inlets hiding paintings yet to be done.

The hard part is not just in finding the right spot but dealing with the constantly shifting nature of tide and atmosphere. When we arrived the air was heavy with a south east breeze bearing fog. It is a stunning land of eagles and seals accompanied by a symphony of gulls. Visual space is ambiguous, determined by gradations of value, color is subdued, everything is distant. Fog envelopes you, there is no horizon, sea and sky merge.

NORTH WIND CLEARING

The wind shifts, now from the north west and you are amazed at the islands that now appear. There is more brilliant blue and deep green than you know what to do with. There is not enough time to start another new painting...........next time.

John Marin

The Pine Tree, Small Point, Maine, 1926

Watercolor on paper, 17" x 22"

Portland Museum of Art, Portland, Maine

We are also here to find where Marin painted. Small Point is just east of here, maybe a few miles by water. In 1915 Marin's NY art dealer was the eminent photographer

Alfred Stieglitz ( Georgia O'keeffe's husband). Stieglitz forwarded him some cash so he could paint for the summer in Maine. Marin took the money, but instead bought an island in Small Point Harbor. I can't say as I blame him. There's plenty of "wicked good paintin' here".

Tomorrow we head down to Cape Arundel.

WEEK 24 / Still Life with Chocolate Truffles

2011-09-09T06:44:00.000-07:00

Still Life with Chocolate Truffles

James Aponovich

Oil on canvas, 8" x 12", 2011

Last Sunday Beth and I had a group of friends over for a "Buon Viaggio" dinner party in anticipation of their upcoming trip to Italy. As gifts, Sylvia brought a bottle of truffle flavored oil and Joanie brought a box of elegant chocolate truffles. Both are called truffles yet both are very different.

The truffle oil went to the kitchen to await some fettuccini to grace. The chocolate truffles went directly to the studio because I was in need of a "model" for this week's painting. I placed seven truffles on the tissue that lined the box.

Visually these were orbs differing in color and texture, all conforming to the passage of light across them. The tissue envelopes them and adds a translucent quality when placed in front of the stripped wall. The blue ribbon adds a melodic line that accentuates the rolling roundness of

the truffles .But with the world as it is........why paint candy?

"It is a gift to be simple...."

Shaker tune

Jean Baptiste Simeon Chardin

A Glass of Water and a Coffee Pot

Oil on canvas, 13" x 16", 1760

Carnegie Institute, Pittsburgh

Many years ago I attended a major retrospective of the French artist Chardin at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. I was just starting out as an artist and I was completely taken aback by his paintings, particularly the still lifes. The smaller ones were modest yet contained an extraordinary strength within a simplicity of form. I distinctly remember a small painting of a glass of water with some garlic bulbs ( A Glass of Water and a Coffee Pot). I was mesmerized with how the light traveled through the glass and across the white bulbs. Reproductions do not do it justice. It was from that point on that I knew I wanted to concentrate on the still life.

Andrew Stevovich

Woman with Pear

Oil on linen, 20" x 20", 2009-10

Andrew Stevovich and I both began our careers as artists in Boston. We met through a mutual friend and collector. We moved to galleries in New York at about the same time and have remained friends through it all.

I admire his painting ability. There is a clarity of color and a masterful use of brushwork that, in my opinion, makes him one of the best painters living today. I thought of Andrew when I needed to lighten and brighten my painting, by adding stripped wallpaper. Artist's are great borrowers, so that in my painting of truffles I am taking the passage of light from Chardin and adding the compositional clarity of Stevovich.

Now, what should I do with those remaining chocolate truffles......Hmmmmm.

For more information about Andrew Stevovich

www.andrewstevovich.com

WEEK 23 / APPLEDORE: Still Life with Peaches

2011-09-03T08:27:00.000-07:00

Appledore: Still Life with Peaches

James Aponovich

Oil on canvas, 10" x 18", 2011

Sometimes paintings do not cooperate. They just don't listen, are stubborn and generally behave

badly. At this point they are sent to spend "time out" with their face against the wall, sometimes for weeks, months or even years.

This painting was started some fifteen years ago as an oil sketch of bunches of grapes, it was not working and soon was abandoned to the basement. The stretchers were ripped off and used for another painting. There it languished until I recently found it and brought it back into the studio.

We now have wild grapes growing on our property and peaches are ripe and beautiful, so I gathered some grape leaves and set out to make things right! The setting for this still life is Appledore Island, part of the Isles of Shoals off the coast of Maine and New Hampshire. Much more painting will be done on Appledore so stay tuned, it's a great story.

THE AMERICAN PAINTING

John Johnston

Still Life, 1810

Oil on panel, 14" x 18"

City Art Museum, St. Louis

I am a big fan of American painters. This country washed clean and refreshed the vision of so many artists. This still life by John Johnston is strangely modern in concept, ( or I am, not so strangely, archaic). My painting is a reinterpretation of this sweet still life.

WEEK # 22 / Three Lemons

2011-08-25T11:22:00.001-07:00

Three Lemons

James Aponovich

Oil on canvas, 11" x 18", 2011

When beth and I travel, we always take drawing supplies with us. Pencils, erasers and paper can be easily packed and transported. Oils however are another matter, what with airline restrictions, transporting canvases, easels, solvents and in the end wet paintings. So, on occasion we pack a set of watercolors and a block of paper.

Study: Three Lemons

James Aponovich

Watercolor on paper, 8" x 13", 2009

The watercolor study above was done on one of our "rainy day" sessions. I found these wonderful lemons at an Italian Greengrocer in Panicale (Umbria), and set to work. With the light uncharacteristically coming from right to left, I did my best to control everything.

Now two years later it is time to attempt the oil painting here in New Hampshire. But I cannot find Italian lemons at my local market so I have to make do with ones from California.

YELLOW

If Blue is associated with spirituality and red, passion, then yellow represents the intellect. Technically, yellow is the most difficult color to control. Being the lightest and brightest color it is easily corrupted when shaded, turning a sickly green. Set yellow against black and it becomes its brightest and most luminous. Given that, it is a chore to control the shading and keep these lemons alive.

Francisco de Zurbaran (1598-1664)

Lemons, Orange and Rose

oil on panel

Norton Simon Museum, Pasadena

Spanish still life painters could control the extremes of value and still keep their colors clear.

This painting by Zurbaran is one of the greatest still lifes ever painted.....in my opinion.

2011 copyright James Aponovich

WEEK # 21/ Peonies in a Canton Bowl

2011-08-19T08:13:00.000-07:00

Peonies in a Canton Bowl

James Aponovich

oil on panel, 8" x 10", 2011

WHEN A PAINTING IS A STUDY FOR A STUDY

In the hierarchy of 'flowerdom' peonies rank right up there as the most difficult to paint. Delicate yet multi-layered they share with roses a beautiful shape and stunning colors. They transition from a tight ball to an explosive full bloom. Those of us who love them really love them.

So, when I was commissioned to paint a large still life, the client requested, no, insisted on peonies. This small painting is a presentation painting meant to illustrate how the flowers are to be arranged and the colors I would be using.

Peonies from our garden

Next comes the study which I am now working on based on peonies from our peony garden, that we call the "peony walk". The larger study ( which I will post when finished) is full scale, measuring 24" x 26". The commissioned painting is larger yet. Wish me luck.

Study: Japanese Peony Vase in a Niche

James Aponovich

Oil on panel, 11" x 14", 2008

This is a quarter scale study to a pair of paintings inset into a piece of furniture. The Japanese are masters at portraying peonies. This is a painting of a Japanese cloisonne vase in our collection.

For information on the furniture

with the painting of the Japanese Peony Vase in a Niche

click on: David Lamb, Furniture Master

For more on our garden check out the variety of garden postings on:

Aponovich and Johansson At Home and Away

Our garden in featured in the book:

The Inspired Garden

Twenty-Four Artists Share Their Vision

Judy Paolini & Nance Trueworthy

Downeast Books

WEEK #20 / HYDRANGEA IN A JAPANESE VASE

2011-08-13T07:27:00.000-07:00

Hydrangea in a Japanese Vase

James Aponovich

Oil on canvas, 10" x 8", 2011

We are still on the coast of Maine, slowly making our way back. They call this "gunkholing",

putting in at one port after another. This painting however, began in Blue Hill. I arose early one morning and while my friend Bob was busy painting a watercolor I sketched this flower on a spare canvas I had. Beth and I are now in Cape Porpoise, near Gooserocks. The landscape here is a soft estuary, much different than "downeast". ( see week #19)

BLUE

If red is passion and blood and yellow is clarity and intellect than blue is calming serenity and the spiritual.

Pol, Hermann or Jan Limbourg

May-Day Excursion, "Les Tres Riches Heures du Duc de Berry", 1410

Tempera on Vellum, 5" x 8"

Chantilly, Musee Conde

Along with pure gold, blue was the most costly color to use until the 18th Century. It was mainly acquired by grinding the semi-precious stones, azurite and lapis lazuli. When the old Duke of Berry commissioned the Flemish Limbourg Brothers to illustrate his prayer book he spared no expense. Along with lapis lazuli for the blue, malachite was ground to create the beautiful greens that adorn the noble women in this May Day jaunt. Because the book was mainly closed, the colors have remained as pure as when they were painted. That is very rare, many mistaken assumptions of color have been made without taking into account the destructive affects of light and atmosphere on paint.

THE VAULT OF HEAVEN

We call it the sky. Sky blue suggests a certain abstract, remote majesty. It descends from its imperial neighbor, purple which represents immediate, concrete but temporal dominion.

Purple was only for the Emperor's toga, not mine. So blue was passed on to the Queen of Heaven as a symbol of maidenhood. In Christian iconography, Mary's color, one of dignity, spirit, and oddly, wealth.

Fra Filippo Lippi ( 1407-1469)

The Coronation of Mary

Santa Maria Assunta, Choir Apse

Spoleto, Italy

In Southern Umbria, lies the city of Spoleto, now famous for it's festivals and jazz concerts. If you find yourself there, go to Piazza de Liberte, grab a gelato and descend

to the Duomo, Santa Maria Asuunta, to see the most spectacular fresco

by my all time favorite painter / monk / father and overall ladies man, Filippo Lippi.

Here is lapis lazuli, gold leaf, malachite and vermillion all coming together in Lippi's last work. He died here at the age of 63, some say poisoned by enraged family members of a youg woman whom, let us say, he had interest in. He is buried here in the Duomo with this:

Here I, Filippo, the glory of painting, lie buried.

There is none who does not know of the extraordinary grace of my hand

with the fingers of an artist I managed to bring the colors to life

and for a long time to deceive those who hoped to hear them speak

even nature, which had found expression in my figures.

was amazed, and admitted that my art was equal to Hers.

Lorenzo de Medici placed me here in this marble tomb

where before I was covered with common dust.

WEEK #19 /" THE DANCE FLOOR", BAKER ISLAND, MAINE

2011-08-06T08:55:00.000-07:00

"The Dance Floor", Baker Island, Maine

James Aponovich

Oil on canvas, 14" x 18", 2011

Sketch: Baker Island, Maine

James Aponovich

Pencil on paper, 7" x 9", 2011

"How to paint the landscape:

First you make your bow to the landscape,

then you wait, and if the landscape bows to you,

then, and only then,

can you paint the landscape"

John Marin

THE PAINTED SKETCH

Granite, spruce, sky, ocean....and the sun relentlessly beating down, my head draped with a shirt like some Bedouin frantically drawing......and the sweat dripping....it is summer off the coast of Maine.

Sometimes the most difficult thing is to make something significant out of the fewest possible ingredients. Boil the perfect egg.

Here I am on the "Dance Floor". The place is Baker Island, off the coast of Mount Desert.

(For more on how I got here go to :

Aponovich and Johansson, At Home and Away , "A Maine Island")

My task is to sketch giant slabs of pink granite that have fractured and have been piled up by eons of repeated "nor'easters", storms of amazing force. The sun is blinding and everything is stripped down to bear essentials. I start drawing, my composition is nothing but diagonals and sharp edges, and all while the clouds build threateningly. Time is limited so I sweat and draw. Captain says it's time to go, storms are approaching. The sky turns black so we return to the boat. Time elapsed? Not nearly enough.

Marsden Hartley

City Point, Vinalhaven, Maine, 1937

Oil on board, 18" x 24"

Hartley painted here, so did Cole, Church, Lane, Haseltine, Richards, Bricher,

Hassam, the Zorachs, the Wyeths and many more. We still come to this place of jagged rock and hard sea, this "wonderful nightmare" that is the coast of Maine.

For further reading and looking:

The Artist's Mount Desert

John Wilmerding

Princeton University Press

Painters of Maine

Carl Little

Downeast Books, Camden, Maine

WEEK #18 / PORTRAIT of the ARTIST'S DAUGHTER

2011-07-29T09:14:00.000-07:00

Portrait of the Artist's Daughter

James Aponovich

oil on canvas, 7" x 5", 2011

I am primarily known as a still life painter. Although I began my career as a figure painter, the still life and particularly flowers have always held my attention. It is enough to deal with composition, color and dynamic energy, but to throw in human"character", that really complicates everything.

That being said, I have always painted portraits.

I could write a book on the experiences, both good and bad, of dealing with art vs. the human beings perception of themselves.......oy vey!

That is why I most often go to subjects that tend to complain the least,

myself (as in self portraits), and my family; my wife Beth and our daughter Ana. This tiny portrait of Ana began as an example of small scale portraiture. It is a three quarter view of of head and upper torso. She is set against a neutral dark background. I like the stark simplicity of the somewhat off set composition.

Antonio Lopez Garcia

Maria, 1972

Pencil on paper, 27" x 21"

Artists have always used family members as subjects, from Rembrandt's touchingly soulful portraits of his wife and son, to the contemporary Spanish artist,Antonio Lopez Garcia's

hauntingly beautiful portrait of his daughter Maria.

THE SYMBOLIC PORTRAIT

Governor Stephen E. Merrill

James Aponovich

Oil on canvas, 52" x 34", 2003

State House, Concord NH

RESPONSIBLE GOVERNANCE IS SERIOUS BUSINESS

In 2003 I was asked to paint the official portrait of former Governor Stephen E. Merrill

of New Hampshire. I chose to paint not only the Governor himself but also deference to the law and people of New Hampshire.

The composition ascends, at the bottom rests a wooden desk, representing the land of New Hampshire with the state seal. On the desk sits open the rule book of legislative procedure signifying the rule of law upon which the Governor's authority is based. The Governor stands in the posture of reading, but he has just looked up at the viewer, still occupied by his thoughts.

He stands in front of a granite loggia with two vertical columns representing the legislative and the judicial branches of government. The linear energy of his body and the panels ascend vertically to the dome of the State House behind and above his head. His eyes are at the transition between the terrestrial and celestial. Artistically this is risky stuff.

The painting now hangs in the State House and belongs to the people of New Hampshire.

WEEK 17 / BLUE HILL, MAINE from SCULPIN POINT

2011-07-21T14:47:00.000-07:00

Blue Hill from Sculpin Point

James Aponovich

oil on canvas, 10" x 14", 2011

CHASING EDEN DOWNEAST

After spending weeks preparing paintings for a number of exhibits, Beth and I finally had the opportunity of visiting a part of the world we were very familiar with, Downeast Maine. We were invited to visit our friends Bob & Sylvia for a week.

Some say that Downeast begins after Camden, while others say you must go beyond Naskeag, and still others claim that the true Downeast doesn't begin until you reach Schoodic Point.

But I'll tell you , after five hours driving east, our Downeast begins in the beautiful coastal town of Blue Hill, Maine.

We used to live near here. We owned a summer house overlooking Eggemoggin Reach and Penobscot Bay, so we know the lay of the land ( or ocean).

Fitz Henry Lane

Blue Hill, Maine, 1850

oil on canvas, 20" x30"

Blue Hill sits about half way between the Camden Hills and Mount Desert Island and has always attracted artists and writers. Fitz Henry Lane painted extensively in the area just prior to the Civil War. It has always been an interest of mine to visit the sites where painters of the past have made famous. In New Hampshire the White Mountains attracted painters such as Thomas Cole and John Kensett, but Maine is the painter's paradise.

My painting originated back in the 1990's with a small sketch I did of a dock off Sculpin Point at the mouth of Blue Hill harbor. I was there to paint a portrait but I could not resist sketching what has to be one of the best views of the mountain.

The sketch has been sitting in the studio so I decided to bring a canvas and do a little "plein-air" painting ( something that I do not like to do).

James Aponovich

View of Blue Hill, Maine, 2005

oil on canvas, 36" x48"

Private Collection

This painting is included in the book, Paintings of Maine, by Carl Little

Back in 2005 I returned to Blue Hill to paint this canvas from Parker Point. Last week we walked past this scene while a blanket of fog lay over the bay, it was fantastic. I hope to return soon to paint it. There is usually ample fog.

Fairfield Porter

The Harbor Great Sprucehead, 1974

oil on canvas, 20" x 36"

While Blue Hill is beautiful it was still "the city", we lived "in the sticks." Beth and I loved Eggemoggin Reach and the Islands of Penobscot Bay. While our daughter attended summer camp a few miles down the road, we would explore the area. Believe me, there were no shortage of boats and people eager to have you aboard.

Just past Butter Island and the Barred Islands is Great Sprucehead, the former summer home of Fairfield Porter, a great painter and critic. His painting gives you the feeling of the sun washed bay and broad expansive views.

I still have one more painting to do of Blue Hill then it is off to the grandaddy of them all,

Mount Desert Island and beyond.

If what we seem to say

mostly concerns the weather

we can expect Downeast

where tide and undertow

and variable winds work endlessly together,

it is because our stay

in part,

at least depends

on how opinions mix

in talk that has to do

far more, we've grown to think,

with love than politics.

Samuel French Morse

For more on our trip to Blue Hill click on:

Aponovich and Johansson, At Home and Away

WEEK #16 / SEACOAST MORNING GLORIES

2011-07-16T07:15:00.000-07:00

Seacoast Morning Glories

James Aponovich

oil on canvas, 7" x 5" (oval 5" x 3"), 2011

During the Renaissance the typical Florentine painter's workshop catered to many clients whose demands were quite varied. At the top were the great mural paintings often commissioned by

wealthy merchants and placed in a church or private chapel. Santa Maria Novella, not far from the Florence train station, is a prime example. These elaborate frescos usually required many assistants to complete the job.

Then there was the decoration of private chapels and the living spaces of grand palazzos. Often these areas contained portraits of the merchant, so now we find the emergence of the individual portrait as an important work of art.

The problem was that the artists needed work year round to fill gaps between these large scale commissions,so they painted things like processional banners and shields as well as domestic furniture. A typical piece of painted furniture was a dowry chest called a 'cassone'. Artists also decorated larger cabinets.

About five years ago

I teamed up with a native New Hampshire Furniture Master, David Lamb of Canterbury.

We began to collaborate on fairly large scale pieces of extraordinary furniture

which we dubbed "Lamboviches".

To date we have completed three collaborations and are now beginning our largest piece called

"The White Mountain Breakfront". It is approximately eight feet high and wide and contains several paintings. Aside from the major painting there are four small ovals that are inset into the four lower doors. I have proposed two concepts, one being the four 'elements' of New Hampshire: seacoast, mountains, industry and agriculture. These are each represented by a still life set into an environment.

Illustrated here is the seacoast represented by an export eighteenth century Leeds pitcher filled with deep blue morning glories. The pitcher on a granite base in front of the Atlantic Ocean with the White Island Lighthouse on the horizon off the coast of New Hampshire.

I faux painted mahogany around the oval to simulate the wood that David Lamb will use to create the actual door.

This is a presentation concept so we will have to wait and see if the patrons like it.

I'll keep you informed.

More to come.

WEEK #15 / TRASIMENO ARTICHOKES

2011-07-08T10:32:00.000-07:00

Trasimeno Artichokes

James Aponovich

oil on canvas, 14" x 10", 2011

If you are fortunate enough to be in Italy in the spring you can expect to be treated to an array of fabulous foods such as fresh pecorino cheese from Pienza where you can still taste the grass that the sheep grazed on. In Rome, spring brings puntarelle, a chicory salad served with an anchovy dressing and perhaps the king of them all, fresh artichokes. Rome is particularly famous for 'carciofi alla giudia', a flattened fried whole artichoke, a specialty of the house at Giggetto al Portico d'Ottavia in the Jewish ghetto.

I purchased these baby artichokes from the Botega in Panicle, Umbria. Panicale overlooks Lake Trasimeno and it is stunning. During rainy days Beth and I would remain indoors to draw. We often would go to either the Green Grocer or the Botega to look for interesting fruits and vegetables. Combined with a bottle of Umbrian Rosso these still lifes did not go to waste.

THE PROCESS

Study: Trasimeno Artichokes

James Aponovich

pencil on paper, 11" x 8", 2009

These are the rainy day artichokes. This study differs from most of my still lifes in that the light source comes from right to left. I usually prefer light coming from the left.

(Reason: I am right-handed, no hand shadows.)

Canvas with pencil and oil wash

A detailed drawing ids transferred to canvas. I could start using full color but because of there being so much green I decide on a reddish underpainting.

Artichokes with sienna wash and painted sky

The warm sienna wash has established the values. A sky is now laid down using seven colors and values. I now proceed to paint the rest of the canvas.

COMPLIMENTARY CONTRAST

This painting is loaded with cobalt green, a soft bluish green. The warm sienna underpainting comes through in minute spots to give the green some punch,

but it calls for it's compliment...red-orange.

Box of Cherries

Elizabeth Johansson

oil on canvas, 13" x 11", 2011

At the same time Beth was painting a box of sour cherries for an upcoming exhibit. In this painting the red-orange or the cherries is balanced by the blue-green of the box, set against a neutral white. She suggested that I use some of the cherries to jazz things up.

I had so much blue and green going on that I could not use a lot of red so....I found old Pieter.

Pieter Bruegal the Elder, 1525-1569

Landscape with Fall of Icarus

Here the overall cool green and brown color scheme is punctuated with the red scarlet of the plowman's tunic. You know, a few cherries go a long way.

WEEK # 14 / SEASIDE NASTURTIUMS

2011-07-02T07:39:00.000-07:00

Seaside Nasturtiums

James Aponovich

oil on canvas, 15" x 16", 2011

Nasturtiums score pretty high on my all time hit parade of favorite flowers. Not only do you have great color in the blossoms but equally fantastic leaf structure. They remind me of water lily pads neatly tiered. This leaf arrangement however is only seen in the garden, for once they are picked the leaves become a tumbled mass. So, for this painting, I simply arranged them from my imagination....where most of this stuff comes from.

Like last weeks roses ( Seaside Roses), I placed them against a clear sky and a cool blue oceanscape. Cool is the key word here. Nasturtium flowers are hot., hot in color that is. To make them even hotter I placed them amongst cool green leaves and blue sky.

WARM / COOL CONTRAST: TEMPERATURE IN PAINTING

Color has visual temperature. We say " red hot" and Ice blue" to express the extremes. Basically, red, orange and yellow are warm, with blue, green and violet being cool. In between colors are yellow -green and red-violet.

WARM

Mark Rothko (1903-1970)

No. 5, No.22, 1950

oil on canvas, 10' x 9'

The Museum of Modern Art, NY

COOL

Vincent Van Gogh ( 1853-1890)

The Starry Night, Saint Remy, June 1889

Oil on canvas, 30" x 36"

The Museum of Modern Art, NY

WARM / COOL CONTRAST

Paul Cezanne (1834-1906)

Fruit and Jug on a Table

oil on canvas, 12" x 16"

Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

Balance ( harmony) is very vital in my compositions.

I have already mentioned Light / Dark contrast (value) as an important component in painting. As we enter the realm of color things get complicated. So, as I move along I will try to break down the elements in my paintings right to the basics.

Oh, did I mention that I have been invited to exhibit a painting or two in a New York City gallery during July and August?

WEEK #13 / SEASIDE ROSES

2011-06-24T07:31:00.000-07:00

Seaside Roses

James Aponovich

oil on canvas, 17" x 12", 2011

This week the rose garden is in full bloom and it is gorgeous. It is time to paint roses.

These roses are called 'Heritage' and they are of the softest and cleanist pink. I originally had in mind a sleeping black cat behind the vase but currently, not having a cat I substituted a cloth.

Beth and I had a house in Maine for twelve years and it was there that we learned to garden. This painting is an homage to gardening in Maine.

In many ways I find that roses are amongst the most difficult flowers to paint. The petal of a rose is very delicate. Often, even with my best efforts, the petals can appear to be made of porcelain. Generally, roses are quite complex and demanding but surprisingly the tulip can also be difficult, not due to complexity but by it's utter simplicity of form.

Being somewhat a superficial gardener ( Beth is the real gardener here) I am prone to be attracted to a plant because of it's history or name.

We have the Apothecary's Rose (oldest rose),

and roses that evoke art or romance: 'Fantin-Latour', 'Charles Rennie Macintosh',

'Shropshire Lad', and my favorite, a gallica rose named 'Rosa Mundi'.

Rosa Mundi Roses

James Aponovich

oil on canvas, 2007

New Britian Museum of American Art

This is a beautiful rose. Rosa Mundi is an ancient mutation of the Apothecary's Rose. It is the rose that Botticelli painted in

The Virgin and the Child with St. John the Baptist, ( see blog post week #5 ).

It is very much a painter's rose.

There is a story connected to it's name and it goes something like this:

Eleanor of Aquitaine was Queen of France and for political reasons was married to Henry II, King of England. However, the King had his royal eye set on the beautiful Rosamund, with whom he had a love affair. Rosamund's favorite flower was rosa gallica 'versicolor', a stunning flower with crimson and white petals. Well, as with all affairs the truth was soon revealed and to say the least Eleanor was quite upset. She immediately had poor Rosamund executed. Sigh...

Every year, to commemorate his love ( and to tick off Eleanor) Henry had Rosamund's grave covered with petals from her favorite rose, now and forever named 'Rosa Mundi'.

Hyperboly? Maybe, but I prefer to believe it. Why not?

WEEK # 12/ SLICED ORANGES IN A BOWL

2011-06-17T07:22:00.000-07:00

SLICED ORANGES IN A BOWL

James Aponovich

6" x 8", oil on canvas. 2011

This is the take-out that never seems to leave the fridge ( see blog posts for week # 6

and week # 8). My task now is to combine the three elements, fortune cookies, take-out box and bowl of sliced oranges and make it work as one complete and ( gulp !) successful painting.

We'll see.

I should note that this painting might come a bit later since now in the garden the peonies and poppies are in full bloom. That means that I must paint them while I can only to return at some point in the future to finish the canvas. I guess it is like playing chess, its not just the move you are making now, but also what the next three will be. This is also why my studio is full of "paintings in progress".

For a closer look at our garden go to Aponovich and Johansson: At Home and Away

Note: If you look closely at the bowl ( Sliced Oranges in a Bowl) you can see a blue- shirted me.... I painted me because A. I am there and B. it adds another dimension which is the environment outside the painting, as the painting is being painted. Get it?

APONOVICH ON REFLECTION

Pieter Claesz ( Dutch)

Still Life with a Turkey Pie ( detail)

Oil on panel, 1627

Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

Still Life with Amaryllis, (detail)

James Aponovich , 2009

Generally a still life painting is a combination of many visual textures, cloth, ceramics, flowers, fruit and metal for example. To a certain degree painting is like cooking, you want to balance different flavors and textures. It relates to what Plato referred to as harmony, a pleasing combination of various elements to create a whole.

In the two details of paintings above, the hard surface of silver is represented. I purposely muted the reflective surface on my sugar bowl, why? Because the still life is set outdoors but the reflection would be indoors( my studio). That being said the reflective surface has fascinated artists ever since the realistic depiction of objects began after the Middle Ages.

MIRROR, MIRROR, ON THE WALL.....

Jan Van Eyck (Flemish)

Giovanni Arnolfini and His Bride, 1434

Oil on wood, 32" x 24"

National Gallery, London

This painting is thought to be a wedding contract and it is loaded with symbolism, slippers all over the place, a marriage bed, fruit on the window sill, one candle burning and little fido standing in front of the two people who are not afraid of conspicuous displays of expensive clothing.

Jan Van Eyck

(detail)

As you look closer you will note on the far wall a convex mirror which reflects the backs of the couple as well as Mr. Van Eyck himself standing in the doorway

witnessing this " for better, for worse" moment.

Diego Velazquez ( Spanish)

Las Meninas, 1656

oil on panel, 10' x 9'

Prado, Madrid

This painting is considered to be the greatest painting by one of the world's greatest

painters, Diego Velazquez. He was First painter and Chief Steward to the Royal Court of Spain under Phillip IV. Good gig!

It's quite a score, what with the Infanta Margarita, maids in waiting, a dwarf, widows, and even Fido again, in front. But don't be fooled, it's all about him, the artist. He stands in front of his canvas dressed to the nines in his "Order of Santiago" smock painting the space that we the viewers inhabit. Well no, not quite. If you look at the back wall (again) you can see a flat mirror and an open doorway with a standing figure. The doorway goes in one direction, out back, but the mirror reflects back to where we are.

Diego Velazquez

Las Meninas (detail)

Reflected in this mirror are none other than the King and Queen of Spain. This ambitious painting illustrates a remarkable manipulation of pictorial space. From the rear exit space spills out of the room into the light beyond. Yet adjacent to the door the reflection portrays the Royal couple in the space that we inhabit, beyond the confines of the canvas. In the middle of it all stands the individual who creates and controls all this space like a ringmaster, the artist Diego Velazquez.

Art does not exist in a bubble. Many outside influences affect an artist's vision and in turn shapes the vision of humanity. This interrelatedness of influence is evident in that Las Meninas was painted only sixteen years after the death of the Italian, Galileo, who with his telescope looked out to the heavens and forever changed and advanced our concept of space.

WEEK #11 / PEARS FROM SANT' ANNA

2011-06-10T06:36:00.000-07:00

Pears from Sant'Anna

James Aponovich

oil on board, 8" x 6", 2011

Often, inspiration for a painting arrives by a rather roundabout way in the creative process.

Study: Two Pears, Sant 'Anna

James Aponovich

Pencil on paper, 3.5" x 2.5", 2010

A case in point is this tiny sketch I drew in the garden of the Monastery of Sant'Anna in Camprena, in Central Tuscany. The moment of influence occurred inside the Dining Hall of this ancient place and it was of a most peculiar manner.

View of the Abbazia Di Monte Oliveto Maggiore, Tuscany

The story begins about five miles north of Sant'Anna at the Abbey of Monte Oliveto Maggiore. Set in the barren, rocky Crete Senese, south east of Siena.

Founded in 1319, Benedictine monks in their white habits continue to live and work at the Monastery repeating a rhythm of life that goes back almost 700 years.

The order commissioned Luca Signorelli of Cortona to paint a cycle of frescos in the Great Cloister depicting the Life of Saint Benedict. After completing only 9 of the 36 alcoves, Signorelli backed off and left the job. My theory is that he was offered a more prestigious and might I say, lucrative gig in Orvieto, but that's just an artist's guess. Anyway, a wacky Sienese artist by the name of Giovanni Antonio Bazzi was brought in. Bazzi was one of the original Bad Boys of art history. The monks nicknamed him "Il Mattaccio" ( the Buffoon). Otherwise he was called "Il Sodoma". Apparently he had a taste for "beardless boys" in his studio. He also kept as pets, badgers, squirrels, apes, marmosets, crows, etc. He must have been tough to live next to.

Il Sodoma

Self Portrait with Badgers

The Great Cloister

Monte Oliveto Maggiore

Here stands Mr. Bazzi himself. The Nobleman's cloke that he wears was given to him by the Abbot after it was left at the monastery by a rich novice.

Il Sodoma

Great Cloister, Monte Oliveto Maggiore

View down the east wing

Sant' Anna in Camprena, Tuscany

At around the same time Il Sodoma was commissioned to paint

the Refectory ( Dining Hall) of the nearby Monastery of Sant'Anna in Camprena, just north of Pienza.

Sant'Anna in Camprena

Interior of the Refectory

Here I was, standing in the Refectory and as often happens Beth and I were totally alone. It was quite an experience to be standing in front of these masterpieces where they have been since their creation, but to be alone! No guards, no people with headphones listening to recordings.

Believe me, you will find more people standing in front of a local gelato stand...

.....so be it!

Il Sodoma

View of Grotesques

Back to' The Pears'. What struck me was when I was leaving I was drawn to the painted decorative friezes on the sides of the door. Literally they were right in front of my nose. These are called grotesques and they originated when Italian artists during the Renaissance traveled to Rome to see the newly excavated "Golden Palace" of the Emperor Nero ( another Bad Boy). They were taken aback by the splendid painted decoration executed in a flat two-dimensional manner. Mythical beasts and exotic floral forms meander over the surface. In my painting I wanted the leaf forms to dance above a slightly humanized pair of Tuscan pears.

So, my little painting was:

Inspired by Il Sodoma

By way of Nero

There in the garden of Sant' Anna

Who would have known?

WEEK #10 / FIVE PEARS

2011-06-02T08:24:00.000-07:00

Five Pears on a Plate

James Aponovich

12' x 11", oil on canvas, 2011

Right now the irises are blooming in our garden and the peonies are almost in flower. This is a very intense and busy time as I must paint each flower group while they are in top form. The season is short so I must commit the flowers to canvas while I can. The remainder of the composition will be dealt with at another time. It is not always the most logical way to paint but it is what it is.

I am also always on the lookout for interesting fruits and vegetables. I found these pears at our local farm stand and loved the elegant stems and their red / yellow color.

THE USE OF FABRIC IN PAINTING

Still Life with Daylilies and Watermelon

James Aponovich , 2004

oil on canvas, 42" x 32"

Currier Museum of Art

I have a few favorite pieces of fabric. Here in the painting Still Life with Daylilies and Watermelon, the same fabric is used (as in 5 Pears) to counter the color and compositional arc of the flowers and landscape. Fabric, referred to as drapery, has always been one of the fundamental elements of Western painting. Apprentices were required to master the seven complex folds of fabric by spending hours drawing.

Drapery Study

Albrecht Durer, 1508

Grey wash with white on toned paper

Albertina Collection, Vienna

Durer always prepared drapery studies with the utmost care and used them masterfully in his paintings and graphic work.

St. John's Alterpiece ( detail)

Hans Memling, 1474

oil on panel

Hospital of St. John, Bruges

While the Italians were busy creating what we now know as the Renaissance, the Northern European painters were gathering in an area known as Flanders. This was the flowering

of "Ars Nova", the triumph of High Realism. In this amazing painting, fabric is layered to create a visual mosaic of color and pattern. While in the south.........

The Visitation

Pontormo, 1528

oil on panel

Santa Felicita (Florence)

Pontormo was a tormented artist ( hey, who's not!) who was responsible for changing Florentine painting from the High Renaissance to Mannerism. He was influenced by Albrecht Durer, who's prints were being distributed throughout Italy. The gossamer fabric glows with vivid and almost unreal hues.

When in Florence, cross the Ponte Vecchio to the Oltrarno and on the left, set into the small Piazza dei Rossi is the Church of Santa Felicita. Inside, on the right is the Capponi Chapel. Put a 50 euro coin in the light box and prepare yourself to be amazed. These are the paintings that broke the back of the High Renaissance.

After, to recover, go outside and across from the church is the Enoteca L'e Volpi e L'Uva . Sit outside and order a glass of Italian wine and a plate of crostini with pecorino and drink in Florence.

WEEK #9 / STILL LIFE WITH APRICOTS AND CHERRIES

2011-05-27T06:31:00.000-07:00

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.

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

2011-05-20T09:05:00.000-07:00

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.

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

2011-05-13T12:14:00.000-07:00

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

2011-05-06T08:48:00.000-07:00

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.

***************************

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?

Painting # 5 / STILL LIFE with STACKED BOOKS

2011-04-28T06:25:00.000-07:00

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.

all Aponovich paintings and text are copyright J.Aponovich

Painting #4 / Clementine in Tissue

2011-04-21T07:07:00.000-07:00

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

2011-04-13T05:02:00.000-07:00

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

STILL LIFE with PEARS, PLUMS and RASPBERRIES

2011-04-08T07:29:00.000-07:00

Still Life with Pears, Plums and Raspberries
12 x 16, oil on canvas, 2011
(painting no. 2)

The pears I painted last week as studies are now placed in a more complex composition.
This painting is part of the "Black Painting Series".
The background is eliminated so that the focus is only on the objects and their reflections.
It is a study of contrasts in color and value, white tissue and black background.

Thematically it refers to a 19th Century Philadelphia painter, William John McCloskey, who was a student of Thomas Eakins.
McCloskey is now known as the "wrapped fruit painter".

William John McCloskey
Lemons
10 x 17, c.1890

Both McCloskey's and my painting are very much in the Western painting tradition with articulated form, perspective and surface detail. However, I went to an earlier source for inspiration, the Southern Sung Dynasty of China.

Mu-ch'i

Six Persimmons

ink on paper, c.1269

The painting is a brilliant example of intuitive composition.

The placement of the fruit is perfect.

THE ARTIST'S VOYAGE

2011-03-31T07:45:00.000-07:00

Two Pears (painting #1)

Paintings can be small or large, size does not determine quality.

This painting of two pears measures 6" x 8". It is a study for a larger painting and was completed in one day. My wife Elizabeth jokingly suggested that I paint one painting every day for a year.

As I cannot ignore such a challenge, I instead volunteered to paint or complete one painting per week.

So it begins, 52 paintings, either already in progress or started anew,

to be completed in 52 weeks.

"Fasten your seat belts, it is going to be a bumpy ride"

Betty Davis