Still Life Anatomy
I have loved making living still lives on my dining table and on all the surfaces of my home this year (countertops, coffee tables, shelves, yada yada). They give me a sense of life changing and evolving around us all the time, a marker of time in the months that have seemed to stand completely still during the pandemic.
I like to call these scenes at home living still lives featuring candles that get burned down, fruit that gets eaten, flowers that bloom and fade. It keeps things going and functions as a marker of the seasons too, as the fruits, scents, and flowers on the table change month to month, week to week.
I’ve loved illustrating these scenes for myself, and I’ve also loved watching my friend Marina of Whim and Vigor create beautiful scenes of her own while exploring digital illustration, a shift from her work in ceramics that she’s made during the pandemic.
So we decided to collaborate.
I set some stages around my house and she took inspiration and created us an exclusive print in a limited batch featuring some of my favorite things: beeswax pillar candles, my Aphrodite flower vase, and some correspondence from the studio (peep that little wax seal).
Shop the exclusive print below, and some of our favorite things for creating your own still life scenes at home.
A Still Life in Three Parts
Part 1: Flowers
Flowers are essential to still lives in our opinion. Fresh blooms, locally sourced, foraged even, are our favorites, but flowers always find their way into our grocery carts.
Part 2: Candles
A flickering flame brings intimacy, warmth, and light to your scenes. Plus the drip of wax off a pillar candle creates a slow energy shift and movement.
Part 3: Knick Knacks
Eucalyptus leaves, seashells, miscellaneous objects like hands and pomegranate vases, and matches are the cherries on top of the perfect still life and can help create the season or energy you want to capture.
