LOCATION: Montreal, Canada
EGGPLANT QUOTE: forces beyond their control
COMMENTS:
In August 2008, Talleen wrote a blog post entitled
Ode to the Aubergine, which, by the way, is her most popular posting. In it, she writes of eggplants in art and sites examples from greats the likes of Paul Cezanne and Henri Matisse and showed their paintings with eggplants. Then, to my surprise, she goes on to mention my
Stray Eggplant project. I found this on an internet search, which I do from time to time just looking to see if there are any unreported pictures of my eggplants out there.
Well, I was delighted to find Talleen's post and decided that anyone who put me in the good company of Cezanne and Matisse deserved their own eggplant. So I read
Talleen's artist statement and with this in mind, I made her an eggplant that says "forces beyond their control."
Here is what she writes about her eggplant:
"These days I’m always on the lookout for little projects for a quick creativity fix. The eggplant photo turned out to be a fun activity that I managed to work on while supper was simmering on the stovetop, which may explain why I photographed my eggplant against the kitchen cupboard.
"Although the photo was staged and shot within twenty minutes, the creative process took place mentally beforehand. Over the days preceding the photo, my family and I were watching the 1956 version of The Ten Commandments. I say days because the film lasts three and a half hours. This movie is filmed in Technicolor, and features mise en scènes that cry, 'Studio scene!' and others that are obviously filmed in the great outdoors of Egypt and the Sinai. I love the studio scenes. When Moses’ birth mother sends him in his basket down the Nile I could practically feel the plastic reeds and smell the chlorinated water. The quality of light in these artificially staged scenes is unique. The actors are drenched in floodlights–there isn’t a shadow in sight. It’s always high noon in these scenes! What I like best about this film is its theatrical quality and this is the atmosphere I wanted to create in my photo.
"I suspended my eggplant with nylon thread from a branch. It kept twirling and capturing the writing proved to be a challenge. To deal with these forces beyond my control, I used a trick my son taught me. This consisted of depressing the shutter button halfway and keeping it that way until I want to snap the photo, at which point I pressed it all the way down.
"I am keeping [my eggplant] in my studio as a reminder that sometimes the forces beyond our control bring unexpected, wonderful surprises, in the mail and otherwise! Thank you Laura Gentry."
