'Pandora's Box', Narrative Still-Life Realism Oil Paintings by Paula Peacock

  

 'Pandora's Box' by Paula Peacock
Oil on Canvas, 16" x 20"

Love, love, love how this one turned out! This painting was years in the planning stages. Planning of the composition, the subject matter, do I include Pandora or not? How to depict the evils of the world? How to depict 'Hope'? In the end, I decided Pandora was overdone and in other paintings I found, Pandora always seemed to be depicted as an overly sexy sex object and a bit on the 'witchy' side. So, I decided to save Pandora the humiliation and let her take a rest from this rendition by painting only the 'box'. All the other elements fell into place after I found the perfect vessel. The apple is representative of Eve, another woman blamed for the woes of the world. But, that will be another story in another painting.

Here's a bit of what I call 'useless information that stuck in my brain for no apparent reason'. It really was NOT a box but a bowl. I guess they didn't do the box thing way back then. There was a misinterpretation of the word bowl to box in the 15th century and it has stuck for the last 500 years.

OIL PAINTING LESSONS in LONGMONT, CO

Contact me (paulapeacock@rocketmail.com) if you're interested in oil painting lessons; private or group. I offer to mentor as well. I also hold workshops on The Basics of Handmade Paper, How to Make Paper Pulp Vessels, How to Paint Mandalas, Acrylic Pouring and more.

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'Looking for Happy' Contemporary Still-life by Paula Peacock

'Looking for Happy'
by Paula Peacock
24" x 30"
Oil on Canvas

In 2014, my little sister lost her battle to breast cancer at the age of 51. Five months later I received a call from the Denver Coroner telling me my son had been murdered. Two days after that horrific phone call came yet another; local police informed me my art studio had been broken into and vandalized. Five of my paintings had been damaged or destroyed. Needless to say, major depression took over my life and I embarked upon a 5-year journey of creating dark paintings and sculptures as my way of expressing my grief. This is one of those paintings-

The Buddhas depicted are known as the Happy Buddha. In this painting, they remain somewhat hidden, in the shadows or behind objects. This is representative of a search for happiness but not quite finding it. One feels it’s just around the corner but never fully in view.

The string is our connection to the different aspects of our lives that define our happiness. Life is represented by the twig of small flowers, not in life-sustaining water, but in cold marbles. The twig has been cut from its’ Mother tree.

The two hanging pendants, one the Endless Knot representing a connection and link with our fates and karmic destiny and second, the Golden Fishes symbolize happiness. The Asian vase, for the most part, is random Chinese characters. But, at the bottom of the centerline are characters representing ‘Mother’ and ‘Warrior’. The left vertical line actually says ‘Christopher’ in English followed by the symbol meaning ‘Son’.

The singing bowl at the top is purposely left vague indicating a silent song or nothing to sing about and the teapot is representational of a hope for emotional healing herbs.

Take weekly painting classes from Longmont, CO artist, Paula Peacock. Private, group lessons available as well as individualized workshops. For more information got to http://paulapeacock.fineartstudioonline.com/

For purchasing please contact Paula at paulapeacock@rocketmail.com To view more of my work go to http://paulapeacock.fineartstudioonline.com/