A Still Life 40, Pear on Top

From the Artist: If I had to describe the effect of this time on my work I would say that it has brought me clearer understanding and familiarity with my daily art practice. This Still Life is from a series of daily still life paintings begun when Covid-19 first began affecting the New York population and before it was identified as a pandemic. Most of the paintings in the series are completed but a few are still in progress, though I stopped making daily still life paintings in May 2020. Most of the series is not stacked fruit as these are. The stacking emerged one day while I was feeling quite overwhelmed by my need to paint daily and the 24 seven nature of teaching Pre-K to 8 Art remotely via the internet combined with both of my college age children studying online while we sheltered in place. I was setting up the fruits to paint while attending a Zoom meeting and trying to negotiate all that was on my plate. Stacking and balancing fruit neatly became a metaphor for the situation we found ourselves in. These paintings are an example of me creating as coping. Through making the daily still lives and several subsequent series I found a sense of normalcy and calm. My art practice buoys me and stacking the fruits kept me challenged, focused, and gave clarity to balancing the circumstances of 2020.