Yes, windows make artists’ lives easier. People love visual images that have a conflict inside, because they are the ones interesting to watch. And a window is the easiest way to create a conflict in a photograph or painting.
Inside vs. Outside
Light vs. Dark
Dull vs. Cheerful
If you don’t know how to create a conflict, paint or photograph a window. Make sure though that there’s at least some difference between the inside and the outside of the window that could be interpreted as a conflict.
In this photograph, for instance, there’s a window, there are flowers, there’s a bag from a jazz festival, but there’s no conflict. It is just a nice photo relevant to my memories of a beautiful summer.
Let me show you two artists who were able to make the conflict just right, with one of them being rather positive, and the other… it is better you see it for yourself.
In this painting (of which I made a photograph) the artist created a conflict between the night outside and the electrical light on the lilacs from the inside. The flowers are made alive by artificial light, very much like Frankenstein. It is a very nice pic, but somewhat disquieting at the same time.
The artist, Valery Secret (that’s his name, I know it is borderline between funny and awkward) is a very good colourist. Fortunately, he is very much alive and active. London will become this painting’s home in February.
The next artist, Igor Obrosov, who died about a decade ago, used to paint flowers and windows as well, but he was repeatedly getting visions of the land of the dead rather than beautiful meadows seen through cottage windows. There is nothing obviously surreal in this painting, but it is eerie and frightening.
It is a great work that opens a window to the world of shadows. Live flowers are dead like Vladimir Lenin in his mausoleum. Two flowers fell down to the table, like eye-balls in a horror flick. Sickly scary, isn’t it?
I understand why Obrosov was a very good artist, but I will never have his work at home.
You see, there are many ways to see flowers on the windowsill.
Sometimes I think that painting takes more time & effort but it is so much easier to paint a conflict than to take a snap of it.
This post was meant to celebrate Valery Secret’s Flowers, which fit the weekly photo challenge much better than my own pic.
Drop me a comment whose paintings (Secret or Obrosov) you may want to see in a greater detail, please, and we’ll keep going!
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Standing Ovation, Seated 
Reblogged this on Lavender Turquois.
I think I have to be in the Secret camp. There’s just something about that painting that I like a lot.
Thank you! It is definitely going to be Secret, next or at least very soon, and I’ll talk about the reasons for his “attractiveness” )
In Obrosov’s painting we see the flowers as they really are in the vase… not lyrical or terribly beautiful but dead. Even the vase is like a grave. Not to mention the eyes…
Of course we see much more in that painting, a great work I believe too.
I do not know the artist, thank you!
Yes, this is what is so depressing about it. It is a serious metaphysical study about life & death, but…not something to be watched daily )
Tough choice, but I will go for Secret which is less obvious to me.
My comment on your post about Morandi somehow did not appear, but I want to say that after years of struggling to understand him, you made the penny drop – thank you for that!
I am so happy to see you back here )
thanks for Morandi – there’s a rather lengthy conversation in Russian following this post there, and it is very interesting. If you still can read a bit of Russian, it can shed more light on Morandi.
Secret be it, then! )
Yes, I can read every bit of Russian and thoroughly enjoyed the exchange. Wow! I first got interested in Morandi after reading Siri Hustvedt’s essay on him in her ‘Mysteries of the Rectangle’ – she is a superb novelist and art aficionado and the book is worth having a look. Her interpretation of Morandi was not convincing, but she was so under the spell of the inexplicable magnetism (which you call religious feeling) of his work that I knew I had to see it live. Even after getting the clue from your post, the spell is still working.
Thank you for the tip: I will find the book. Understanding why something is working does not have to be a barrier to enjoying the work of that something ))
I love the fresh May lilacs, naturally.
And so, this is a vote for Secret ) Good, He’s a very lyric artist.
Yes, those eyeball flowers are indeed scary, had already noticed the eyeball-ness of them before I got to your comment about it!
Yep, the cut flowers are looking at you more intently than you look at them, not to mention that they look back at all. Just keep imagining the accompanying sounds and there’d be no need for Stephen King. ))