John Stobart

The Brig Pilgrim Entering Monterey

1987

During his successful career as a goldsmith the desire to paint grew on Dutch artist René Smoorenburg (1954). The attention to detail, which was of great importance in his work as a goldsmith, proved of great value in painting his one of a kind still life’s. In "Cream puff with strawberries" the artist's attention to fine detail is traceable in the way he painted the sprinkle of powdered sugar, the lightness of the whipped cream, the shimmer on the strawberries and so on. All the fine details create an effect of trompe-l'oeil, the painting is deceptive realistic. His work stands in the long tradition of Dutch still life painting, originated in the seventeenth century, with its highly refined and meticulously executed depiction of reality. His work is in the spirit of many of those great works but retains its own distinctive style. Although René Smoorenburg works at a few paintings at the same time, the time it takes him to finish one individual painting amounts six months. Because of his very detailed style of painting, this time span is necessary to complete the work with a lot of patience and endurance. In contrast to the masters of the Golden Age, he chooses to emphasize the vulnerability, fragility and imperfection of everyday objects in his still life’s. According to René Smoorenburg, beauty is not perfection, but in the trace of the past and the evidence of enduring ravages of time. René Smoorenburg finds his sources of inspiration at antique fairs and markets: worn shoes...

Watercolor on paper

Still life with flowers. Oil on canvas, 110x80 cm

Claudine Picard is a French artist born in 1949 who lives & works in Sainte Marie, France. She is graduated from the Ecole Nationale des Arts Décoratifs in 1973 (ENSAD).