Still Life with Olive Oil Print

Painting during the Covid19 lockdown of 2020 was a lifeline to normality and sanity. I painted almost every week with a group that had started as a still life class from Otis College of Art and Design. We took a painting journey over Zoom together from our home studios and garages to every place that painting and our imaginations could take us - the Italian countrysides of Corot, the French seascapes of Monet, the dreamworld of Odilon Redon, and more. We also journeyed through techniques, subjects and media. The subject matter that most obsessed me in 2020 was what we could eat, make and find in our cupboards and pantries. This painting came from an exercise to do a painting entirely with a palette knife. I chose to assemble a still life from a can of Portuguese olive oil, an avocado, a lemon, and the box for Transcontinental Rum Line Guadeloupe Rum, all necessary provisions for making it through the pandemic.