Colette Hosmer commissioned by the New Mexico Museum of Art

Written by Norman Wildman Saturday, 20 November 2010 16:25

Santa Fe, NM - Artist Colette Hosmer has been commissioned by the New Mexico Museum of Art to create a three-dimensional work replicating a painting attributed to Jacopi da Empoli entitled Fish and Crustaceans, an oil painting from c.1630. The painting displays various types of fish and crabs, representing the bounty of nature. The sculpture Hosmer created was commissioned for inclusion, along with four others, in the museum’s exhibition NATURA MORTA: Still-Life Painting and the Medici Collections Featuring the Art of Colette Hosmer on view from June 8 through August 5, 2007.

Hosmer describes her selected work this way: “When I chose to reproduce Jacopo da Empoli's ca. 1630 still life painting Fish and Crustaceans in three-dimensions, I was blissfully ignorant of the monumental task at hand. I seem to begin most worthwhile adventures this way.

“Over months, through the solitary exercise of reproducing in three-dimensions, the crab, eight fish, eels, seaweed, pottery and fruit depicted in Empoli's dimly lit, two-dimensional artwork (and then casting and painting each object to duplicate the original) I am earning a true understanding of the statement made by the great still-life painter, Jean Simeon Chardin, in his studio in 1765;

‘After interminable days and nights burning the midnight oil in front of immobile, inanimate nature, we are presented with living nature; and suddenly the work of all the preceding years seems reduced to nothing: one was no more awkward the very first time one picked up a pencil. You have to train the eye to look at nature; and how many have never seen it and never will."

Chief Curator of the museum, Tim Rodgers, Ph.D. explains his reason for including a contemporary artist in an exhibition of Baroque painting: “When the opportunity to present a significant selection of Baroque still-life paintings from the Medici Collections was offered to the museum, I immediately began to think about how we could incorporate Hosmer’s work into the exhibition. The desire to combine contemporary art with the art of the past is something I explored in the exhibition of Edgar Degas’ sculptures. Because the boundary between contemporary and historical art is arbitrary and constantly in flux, I prefer to mix art from the past and present that links together because of shared ideas. In this case, the affinity between the Baroque painters in the exhibition and Hosmer is extremely apparent despite the fact that they lived hundreds of years apart.”

The paintings included in this exhibition from the Medici Collection demonstrate both the art of natura morta, meaning still life—depicting all forms of nature: flowers, fauna, fruit, vegetables, and animals, both alive and dead; and trompe l’oeil, to fool the eye. The exhibition offers the opportunity to see works of art that illustrate “abundance in nature,” with these two artistic techniques linking the work of Hosmer to the greatest Baroque painters.

Hosmer’s work, her piece commissioned for Natura Morta, and the work of the Baroque artists are designed to appeal to the senses. Hosmer’s; “Art puts ‘man’ back into the equation,” can be applied to the art of the Baroque period which would at times remind the viewer through subtle symbolism – a dead flower or piece of overripe fruit – of his own mortality and one-ness with nature. For a more in-depth view of Colette Hosmer, read Tim Rodger’s article about her in the summer edition of El Palacio magazine. You will find it on the web, www.elpalacio.org

The New Mexico Museum of Art was founded in 1917 as the Art Gallery of the Museum of New Mexico. Housed in a spectacular Pueblo Revival building designed by I. H. and William M. Rapp, it was based on their New Mexico building at the Panama-California Exposition (1915). The museum's architecture inaugurated what has come to be known as "Santa Fe Style." For more than 90 years, the Museum has collected and exhibited work by leading artists from New Mexico and elsewhere. This tradition continues today with a wide-array of exhibitions with work from the world’s leading artists. The New Mexico Museum of Art strives to bring the art of New Mexico to the world and the art of the world to New Mexico. Visit : www.nmartmuseum.org The New Mexico Museum of Art is a division of the New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs.