Description
My mom and I took a short trip in late fall 2009 to see an exhibit of Joseph Raffael’s paintings at the Nancy Hoffman Gallery. Seeing his huge paintings up close was an amazing experience. It’s a whole-body-experience to view them this way – especially a collection of them all at once. I had a strange experience after being with them for an hour or so. I was overcome with this strong need to leave the gallery. I think I was overcome with the desire to make art this big and beautiful and I hadn’t given myself permission to be that audacious and/or didn’t know if I was up for the task and I just couldn’t bear witness to it any longer. I’ve since made one pretty big painting so I’m headed in that direction… But all of that is not about this painting! These tartlets and cakes were in a window case at Petrossian on 7th Avenue, not far from Central Park. OMG! We had to stop to take a closer look and take a few photos, of course. Petrossian (which started in Paris by two Armenian brothers in the 20’s) is known more for their caviar, than their sweets. But these are so gorgeous, they needed to be painted! My friend and fellow artist Eleanor saw it and said “that’s lucscious.” And so it was named. This is the third painting of sweet things this year – I’m going to give them a rest for a while. Vegetables are calling.
October 2011
