Shantay Robinson
In the hierarchy of art, still life paintings have been generally regarded less highly than portraits, genre paintings, and landscapes. But they are probably the most well-known genre of art besides portraits and landscapes. Still life paintings often decorate living spaces and line the walls of office buildings and hotels. The term still life describes a work of art that depicts inanimate objects from the natural or man-made world, such as fruit, flowers, dead game, and vessels like baskets or bowls, basically describing things that are still and do not move.
Still life painting as a genre was created as far back as in ancient Egyptian tombs and they are still created in works of contemporary art. The genre became particularly popular in the Netherlands during the 17thcentury as a result of urbanization and an emphasis on personal possessions. Whereas the most popular still life paintings of an historical nature depicted fruit and flowers, today there are opportunities to experiment with new techniques, forms, and styles. The genre has relatively been lost to art history, but it deserves some renewed consideration.
Contemporary still life paintings do not only replicate fruit and flowers. Artists today are looking at still life painting anew by abstracting them or using unorthodox materials to create them. Still life paintings allow for painters to demonstrate their technique and allows the viewer to look closely at that technique without being distracted by other ephemera within the canvas. Though still life painting is not as popular as it once was, the still life paintings by Black artists, including Charles Ethan Porter and Hughie Lee Smith from the past remain breathtaking and those of the contemporary moment by Hugo McCloud are experimental and considerably impressive.
Untitled (Cracked Watermelon) (ca. 1890)
Charles Ethan Porter (1847 – 1923)
Charles Ethan Porter is the only known early historical African American artist to have focused on the still life genre of painting. Though his career started out well during the second half of the 19th century, by the early 20th century, still life had gone out of vogue. Porter found himself destitute, often trading artworks for his necessities. During his lifetime, famed author Mark Twain acquired one of his artworks and hung it prominently in his dining room. After he returned from studying in France, the still life genre, which already wasn’t as highly regarded as other genres, had lost favorability. Impressionism became the style of the times. According to Hyperallergic, only nine out of 54 known artworks are in museums even though over the past 20 years, his work has entered prominent collections. The Metropolitan Museum of Art acquired Untitled (Cracked Watermelon) (c. 1890). It’s thought that most of his painting may be privately held, unidentified, or lost.
Still Life with Nectarines (1982)
Hughie Lee-Smith (1915 – 1999)
As a worker in the Federal Arts Project of the Works Progress Administration, Hughie Lee-Smith was concerned with the contribution art could make to social justice. In 1967, he was the second African American to be elected to the National Academy of Design after Henry Ossawa Tanner. Lee-Smith’s work is included in the collections of Metropolitan Museum of Art, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Detroit Institute of Art among other notable institutions. In this still life, Lee-Smith depicts a box, a bottle of wine, a peach, an apple, a notebook, and a pencil. As a still life, this painting assembles inanimate objects in order to use painterly techniques like light, shading, hue, and form, displaying the artist’s abilities.
Translated Memories (2021)
Hugo McCloud (b. 1980)
Hugo McCloud is a contemporary artist who uses industrial and discarded materials in his artworks, particularly single-use plastic bags to make still life paintings. He enjoys the complexity of working with unconventional materials, but it might be his insecurity of being an artist who was not traditionally trained that makes him exert extra labor and effort in his artworks. He creates layers in his paintings to find value. Although McCloud might be “painting” a still life of flowers in a vase, using single-use plastic bags, he’s making a statement about preserving our environment, and in a way, commenting on the beauty it produces naturally and the malice that people contribute to its imminent decimation.