Inspiration and Creation

I do love still life art and still life photography is a very important part of my work (and the one I like to think I am not too bad at for that matter). However, I do not like being obviously repetitive and am always thinking how I can create something different yet recognizably in my style. A lot of the time it is not easy and the more I do it the harder it is to get inspired. The other day, as I was doing my usual browsing on Flickr, I came across this painting by a French artist. It is just a vase with flowers but I loved the combination of muted colours so much I instantly knew I wanted to emulate them. So that was it - the inspiration was born. It can be just one thing - either the subject, or texture, or shape, light or colour, and in this case it was colour. The rest comes naturally.


The peony landed itself perfectly to the floral composition and the desaturated red colour tone I wanted it to be. A few twigs of London Pride from the garden add unusual, quirky and pretty note to the bouquet. I like the soft painterly whiteness of the scarf and soap bag their tone echoing the one of the white roses.

The painting by Jean-Baptiste-Siméon Chardin - "A Vase of Flowers" 1750



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