WSJ, Sept. 17, 2014
With that in mind, when it came time to choose an artwork to interpret this month, I selected "Berkeley #54," a 1955 canvas by American painter Richard Diebenkorn (1922-1993), part of the collection of the Albright-Knox Art Gallery in Buffalo, N.Y. I like the chalkiness of Mr. Diebenkorn's paintings, the way he scraped at his colors and the tension between his energetic lines and a persistent sense of order. Most important, this canvas, from his Berkeley Series (1953-1955), has the warmer earth tones I was seeking to evoke September.THE INSPIRATION | 'Berkeley #54,' a 1955 canvas by American painter Richard Diebenkorn (1922-1993) The Richard Diebenkorn Foundation. |
To contain this arrangement, I chose a 19th-century French earthenware confit pot that I picked up in Hudson, N.Y. Its chalky patina felt suitably Diebenkornish. Although it could just as easily hold a simple van Gogh-esque massing of sunflowers, I pushed my flower palette, taking cues from Mr. Diebenkorn's canvas to create a generous, more complex wildflower bouquet.
Even though the style of this design would be considered natural, I didn't completely freestyle it but took care to get the right undulation of form and to capture the look of Mr. Diebenkorn's work. I started with the bigger, firmer blooms, like the sunflowers and yarrow, to establish a basic structure. Next, I worked in the softer flowers, fennel and Queen Anne's Lace. Then I massed together mauve button mums as a nod to the color blocking you see in the painting. To prevent the arrangement from taking on an overly mounded form, I poked in some spokelike sprigs of light purple amaranth and yellow lysimachia. When I stood back to appraise the bouquet, it was as if a sunny ball of light had landed on my table.
No comments:
Post a Comment