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COLLECTOR'S FOCUS
FLORALS & BOTANICALSD
uring the Golden Age in the Netherlands, tulip bulbs
fetched extraordinary prices in a market bubble
called “tulipmania.” Tulips had been introduced
in the late 16th century and featured prominently
in the lush floral still lifes of the Dutch masters. The bubble
collapsed but tulips continued to fascinate artists, gardeners
and other lovers of beauty. Cut tulips have a life of their own,
often growing an inch after being cut and, being phototropic,
arcing toward the light.
Larry Preston is a lover of beauty. He says, unapologetically,
“I do not paint to be relevant, for an audience or make any state-
ment other than the beauty to be found in the objects I choose to
paint. If the viewer chooses to attach some meaning to my work,
that would be their prerogative. I find that, in this modern world,
there is too little observance of the beauty in our surroundings.”
In Tulips he pairs the flowers with an antique wooden
clamp—the ephemeral with the long lasting. The simple beauty
of the clamp’s worn, warm wood contrasts with the translucent
pink tulip blossoms that show off their subtleties in the bright
raking light.Flowers in the allium genus also grow from bulbs and present
globes of purple star-like blossoms. The genus also includes
edible bulbs such as garlic, onions, leeks and chives.
Janet Monafo placed garlic bulbs on a shiny plate for her
pastel Garlic Reflected. Although I’m sure that she and her
husband, Paul Rahilly, enlivened some meals with the tasty
garlic, she says, “garlic with stem and remains of roots is more
about the visual aspect than the culinary aspect; the stem with
the bulb bursting out at the end with its scruffy remains of roots
and the clove shapes making small forms within the larger form
of the bulb are of visual interest to me; I probably set the garlic
by chance, on a reflective plate, one of many in my studio, and it
just happened; the contrast in surface and texture of the smooth
and shiny silver plate and the papery and relatively rough surface
of the garlic, stem and roots, worked for me. The green stickers
satisfied my thirst for chroma.” Chroma is a main character in her
work and unexpectedly enlivens her monochromatic works with
the appearance of a red twist tie, the blue rim of a metal mug and
here, the green sticker of the store-bought garlic.
Large, splendid, lush peonies are the mainstay of manyGARDEN
Delights
1 23- Vose Galleries, Garlic Reflected, pastel on paper, 15 x 18", by Janet Monafo. 2. Arden Gallery, Silent Elegance, oil on canvas, 32 x 40", by Alexandra Averbach.
- Abend Gallery, Roses and Shade, oil on panel, 13.78 x 11.22", by Jon Doran.
BY JOHN O’HERN