Composition and St Francis

Composition and St Francis, egg tempera on panel 16 x 23 cm

There is that game that writers play where they try to put random words in their text.  This still life is certainly a random mix of objects. And I had this idea as I was composing a still life another time that it would be interesting to print out some other objects (besides the myriad that I have collected - too many) to place in front of the actual different objects. Sometimes I change the objects into other objects than are in front of me in the painting process, but in this case it would be declaritvely not what it appears.

Since a still life is really just an arrangement of shapes and colours, by having a paper version of exactly the colour and shape I want, it would be playful and self-conciously direct, I thought - maybe.

I guess it turned out to be Mary Fedden meets surrealism!