
In Still Life We Trust: Audubon to Warhol
“Surprising” isn’t exactly the first thing that comes to mind when I utter the words “Still Life.” In fact, it tempts me to hit the snooze button and enter autopilot mode. Where’s the passion, where’s the energy? Where’s the erotic force? After all, didn’t someone once say that all art is about sex?
However, once again, I have been shown my ignorant ways because as it happens, still life paintings do have personality, and an American one at that. (Please don’t take my citizenship away).
The Philadelphia Museum of Art’s new exhibition Audubon to Warhol: The Art of American Still Life, unearths the uniquely American history that can be traced through still life’s beginning in the late 1700s up until the Pop Art era. Peale, Goodes, O’Keeffe, and yes you guessed it, Warhol, will all be rubbing elbows in the land of the Liberty Bell.

Andy Warhol, American, 1928 – 1987
© Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
Buy your tickets now for this national salute to still life, and prepare to be surprised at the astonishing variety. Who knows, maybe the secrets of your own identity will be located somewhere in Peale’s peaches and if it’s not, don’t despair! Keep digging in Parkstone’s , Audubon’s Birds, Warhol,and Pop Art.
- By Kate Ready

Raphaelle Peale, American, 1774 – 1825.

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