Harriet Murphy
St Scholastica's College Glebe Point
"WITH AN APPLE I WILL ASTONISH PARIS": CÉZANNE'S TABLE
Painting
Plaster of Paris wraps, acrylic paint
For Paul Cézanne the most important thing in his paintings was the relationship between colours and forms in space, not the precise identities of these objects. I find Cézanne's work intriguing in the way that he uses simple representations to create a work of complexity through colour and shape. My body of work represents Cézanne's still-life painting, The Basket of Apples, in the physical plane while referencing his painting style. Cézanne aimed to create works of beauty from the ordinary. He once said, “With an apple, I will astonish Paris”, influencing modern art, and inspiring me.
My artmaking practice has been influenced by the study and interpretation of Paul Cézanne, The Basket of Apples.
Marker's Commentary
This still life arrangement cleverly creates a dialogue between painting and sculpture. While the work takes on a 3D form, the conceptual basis is all about painting and Cezanne’s legacy. It offers a postmodern reinterpretation and a re-examination of the relationship between colour and form. Each object has tactility: from the formal arrangement of sponge finger biscuits on their blue dish to the multiple apples, basket, bottle and tablecloth (which more closely resembles a painting cloth). There has been no attempt to hide the surface of the soaked mesh. Rather, it adds a rawness, as if carrying the scars and memories of its past life. Combined with the saturated colour the work creates a direct connection to Cezanne’s ‘Basket of Apples’ and his intent to capture the ordinary in a new way through paint.
