This is an original oil painting which I called Holly. It is the first in my recent series of vertical still lifes, and the objects in it have a lot of associations. The painting experience for me has serendipitous moments - which give it its magical nature. When I was in art school, one of my roommates was a young woman named Hollis Sigler. At the time, I was taking a photography course, and I carried my camera everywhere, hoping to get some good photos of people. I took a photo of her in this reflective pose, she unaware of my camera. I printed out a large black-and-white print of the photo, and kept it, along with many others, for years. This photo of Holly, though, stayed in my mind, I think because to me the image represents the artist - as a thoughtful, reflective being. I have painted this image many times in my life.
In terms of the magical quality of art - about 10 years ago, I began coming across the name Hollis Sigler in my art magazine reading, and casually wondered if it could be the same person I had known. The articles referred to a feminist artist who lived in the Midwest; there were no pictures of her included, so it wasn't until I got on the Internet that I was able to find a picture of her. It was indeed Holly. This was amazing to me, because of my association of her with my concept of 'artist,' that she indeed was a serious and successful painter. (As a student she majored in Illustration; I didn't know of her serious interest in fine art.)
When I did this painting, I didn't realize that Holly really was an artist. But that's what I wanted her image to represent. I wanted the three primary colors - red, blue and yellow - for this painting, plus a light blue-gray; also some smaller areas of black, violet and orange. The Cheerios box is included because I absolutely love this box! The yellow "cube" of it, and the bowl filled with milk, Cheerios and strawberries. That was a joy to paint! Alongside this is an image of a classical Greek head, which is the supposed antithesis culturally - high and low art; but to me, they are both beautiful. Birds are in many of my paintings, because I have birds, and I like their visual presence in my work, as well as their metaphorical associations for me. So, there are real fake birds in the foreground; there are images of birds on one of the boxes; and there is a birdcage in the center, which is actually taken from a painting by Morisot, whose work I love. I like the idea of real versus unreal versus depicted image in a painting.
There are other objects chosen for their shape and color, like the box of eggrolls, the can of olives, a can of mandarin oranges, and a box of teabags. There is also a small white stone, which I collected on a trip, in the center foreground between the birds. The color violet as shadows on the table unites the objects. I entered this painting in an exhibition, and at the opening I overheard two men arguing about it. One was saying, "...but there are birds on the table!" And the other answered, "That's because it is more than just a still life." I wanted to run over and thank the second man, for realizing what my painting was about, and for putting it so succinctly. There are things I want to express, some of which I can't verbalize. I get images and impulses to paint, and I know they connect in some way, though I don't always know why. And that's OK too. My work generally wants to express the preciousness and fragility of life, and its invisible poetry, which I see in still lifes like these.
