Still Life that looks like a landscape
You are to make a painting of a still life—that is, a
painting whose subject is of a collection of objects—that reads like a
landscape. Typically, a still-life
painting involves a collection of objects that sits on a surface very much like
a stage. The space in it is fairly
shallow, the objects are usually about life sized, and the viewer’s eye level
is above the objects. In your painting
you are to “question” the conventions of the typical still-life painting and
make a painting that uses enough of the conventions of landscape painting to
read, at least at a glance, as a landscape.
To do this you must consider the conventions of landscape
painting. Typically in a landscape there
is a wide variety of space: shallow, medium, and deep (or even infinite)
space. Linear perspective and
atmospheric perspective are techniques used to suggest the illusion of space in
the landscape that are rarely used in still life. What if you were to use them?
Have fun and good luck!
