Black Tulip Sculpture

This sculpture is part of my collection of still lives made sculptural. Inspiration came from Dutch floral still lives as well as Dutch ceramics. I molded the little plates from my Dutch great-great grandmother's collection of Asian miniature porcelains that were all the rave way back then with Delft blue finishes. I wanted to blur the line between what is painted on the vase, wines and grapes, and how they become three dimensional. The painting was informed by the 19th century Asian school of painting, in particular the Japanese painter Jakuchu. The subject matter is the folly for the search for the perfect black tulip in Holland in the 17th century, where fortunes were made and lost with the investment in tulip bulbs. Roosters adorn the plates.