December 29, 2018 | Annie Salness | 8 Comments | Annie Salness, Blog, Classes, mixed media, persimmon, Postcards, recipe, still life
Last January, a student in one of my painting classes brought in these lovely persimmons for us to paint, so I arranged them so that my students could do some still life paintings.
Aren’t they beautiful? I love that rich, amber yellow color.
Persimmons ready for still life painting.
Finally, almost a year later, I decided to make a painting of a persimmon. It always helps me to connect a story or memory to the subject. That way I’m not just painting a persimmon, I’m emotionally connected to the subject.
I had this memory of my “second mom”, Patty. Her daughter was my best friend, Eileen, and they lived just down the street until I moved away when I was 11. Eileen and I would always be at one house or the other during our childhood.
At Christmastime, our tradition was to go over to their house and bake a TON of cookies! Patty’s daughters would bring over their Kitchen Aid mixers, and with those machines whirring, we’d cream butter, sift flour, listen to Christmas music and the holiday assembly line would begin. We’d make at least twelve different kinds of cookies and one of them was persimmon.
I recently texted Eileen to ask her about her mom’s persimmon cookies and did she have her recipe. She sent back a picture of her mom’s handwritten recipe. There’s something so special about someone’s handwriting…it’s distinguished and unique, and theirs.
I printed the recipe and used it as collage addition to the still life painting I was working on. This painting makes me think of Patty, of my best friend, and of all those wonderful Christmastimes we had.
Here is Patty’s recipe:
Here is the collage.
Here is a detail of the painting where you can see the recipe.
Patty didn’t sign her recipes but I included her signature and I got to place my signature next to hers.
Here is the finished painting. 36″x 48″, acrylic and collage.
Here’s the lovely Patty, herself. I miss her!
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