What a visual shock! This the first time I have no words to describe my feelings! Quite litterally flabbergasted! You...have...overcome Luis Melendez, Master !
What a perfect execution of a decidedly "imperfect" tomato, including the scars and wormhole - love it! Looks like the heirloom Brandywines we grew in our garden over the past two years. What a delightful still life :).
The hole is just an extreme version of the folds, it's a 'grown' hole not a wormhole. I had half of the tomato (it weighed about a pound) for dinner cooked as a fresh tomato and basil sauce served with my pasta.. yum
As Anders—who lives two miles away— knows, it was too windy/dangerous to venture out further than the veg patch today
I'm jealous, your getting tomatoes and basil already. Here in New England my tomato plants are still babies and the basil is about 4 inches high.
Lovely painting, I can smell them...
I love the contrast between the "natural" and the "man-made": pottery bowl, tomato-basil, and then knife -- not to mention the painting itself! I also loved the reference to Luis Melendez, Alain, because it led me to the discovery of Loran Speck. One particular statement seemed most appropriate to the "worm hole"/"not worm hole": the imperfection in the tomato in a Loran Speck vegetable was called "the concept of mortality through imperfection." Whose bowl is this, Julian?
It certainly does not have the "perfection" of the lovely David Garland pottery that you so love (as do I), and therefore adds interesting dimensions to the "imperfection" of the tomato.And to think of our Ruthie-dear eating a strange thai green curry.... How soon will you be back to "imperfect" tomato/basil country?
I am not an expert at anything, but I know true beauty when I see it and, I too am jealous of the tomato and your talent. My tomatoes are small and green here in the midwest USA as are my paintings.
Hi julian and Ruth - yum yum yum, did you grow these things in your veg patch? I've trying to do toms outside for years but to no avail - the gastric juices are really going, you clever person xxxx Mhairi
I have about 15 tomato plants growing but this whopper came from the market, I guess ours will be ready in a couple more weeks—as long as this mistral stops!
Hi Julian Again I love the contrasts in the composition: red/green, earth colours (pot, lower foreground colour/black; round(tomato, pot, knife handle/pointed (knife, basil leaves, tiny tomato leaves. What I especially love is the silver knife edge (its colour is echoed in David Garland's pot) that is poised to go into the tomato; it did and you enjoyed a lovely pasta with wine perhaps. Thanks for this wonderful painting that I saw this morning. BM
I have to say Julian that the interpretation of today's pot seems different than in the garlic in the pot painting. I thought I saw buildings, abstractly rendered in today's painting. Of course the light plays on the pot in a different manner and changes the colours. That's what makes your painting so fascinating.
What Alain said about the pumpkin was the same for me. At first, before I really focussed on it, that's what I "saw." To think that it's been ingested and is now gone...but the painting will last forever.
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As Anders—who lives two miles away— knows, it was too windy/dangerous to venture out further than the veg patch today