Most people tend to think of the Dutch in relation to still-life paintings, but I prefer to look towards the French. Eighteenth century academy-trained artists like Jean Baptiste-Simeon Chardin had a special way with manipulating colour and tone in still life paintings that made the works seem realistic, but not too much so...
Fideli Sudvquist, the Swedish artist and illustrator with a penchant for papercutting, has a similar touch in her craft. I first saw her works on Miss Moss' site and did a quick double take; whilst the leaves of her artichoke seemed like a well-done paper copy, the loose pegs of the garlic were so realistic I had to squint at my computer screen a few seconds before deciding that, they too, were made of paper.
Evoking the same 'frozen moment' quality of all the good still-life works out there, Sudvquist's pieces possess a charm of their own because of the fact that elements in the compositions are painstakingly crafted from paper. I like these works, as well as Olivia Jeczmyk's photography and Joanna Lavén's food styling in each shot.
Food-based compositions like Chardin's The Ray probably didn't last longer than a day or two - maybe three at most. Thus, I wonder how long Sudvquist's versions lasted before then inevitably began to look, well, like old crumpled paper pieces?
NB Images Courtesy Fideli Sudvquist
