Candy Sticks

When we were in New York in February of 2009 with our daughter who was then 11 years old, we visited museums and art galleries all day, and then finished up with a visit to a candy store.  Two of her favorites were Dylan's Candy Bar, and Economy Candy on the Lower East Side.  

I've always admired the Spanish 17th century paintings of sweets.  Others stand out for me - a painting by Jospeh Decker titled "Hard Candy."  Charles Bell's gumball paintings are extraordinary.  

I've wanted to paint candy in some permutation for some time.  The above painting came out of working with the mason jar filled with pennies and then thinking about the current economy and themes of poverty and thrift.  The old-fashioned peppermint sticks potentially evoke a less affluent time.  Candy sales have been used as an economic indicator - sales go up because it's a small indulgence.  

Glass is always an intriguing subject to me - and I loved painting this glass in particular because of the wording on the mason jar which says:  Mid West Canadian Made.  The pattern of stripes distorted through the glass was interesting in its complexity - the different layers of the reflections in the glass, the candy seen through the glass, and all the light bouncing off the inside of the glass. 

It's interesting, too, to think about the humble still life paintings of the 17th century - the Dutch paintings of bread and sardines, for example, with their monochrome colours, and then to compare them in your mind to the pronkstilleven or ostentatious still lifes of the past.  The candy sticks painting then relates to the bodegones or humble still lifes, but the colours used are contemporary and the palette is bright and vibrant.   

Some contemporary hyper-realists, such as Roberto Bernardi and Pedro Campos, have also painted candy.  It's a popular and fun subject matter, given the colour, texture and shapes as well as the general appeal.  Their work is really impressive and I have a great deal of appreciation for it.  But instead of the photographic interpretation that they achieve, I'm after a slightly more abstracted  or painterly version of the motif. 

So many people ask me, don't you ever get bored of painting still life?  The thing is that the permutations are endless - the possible arrangements of things that you can put on a table or slab or piece of glass.  The wide variety of subject matter is endlessly intriguing.  I've never painted candy before, though I've painted still life for 25 years.  It's very exciting to me that I can continually find new subject matter and learn more about the process of painting through it.