Glass of Water and Coffee Pot

Jean-Baptiste-Simeon Chardin

            Jean-Baptiste-Simeon Chardin was born on November 2, 1699 in Paris, France. Chardin was a French painter who specialized in still lifes and domestic scenes. He is known for his remarkable ability to produce amazing realism.  Chardin prefered to paint simplistic textured still lifes, interiors of homes as well as genre paintings. Chardins genre paintings often included children, kitchen maids, and domestic activities of the middle class life.  Chardin was one of the very first French artists who appreciated, respected and glorified the lives of womaen and children through his work. He was a caring man who sympathised with the work load of women and young mothers. Chardin was a passionate painter, however he painted rather slowly.  He only produced about four paintings a year, producing a little more than 200 paintings during his lifetime.   His style of painting is best known for the overall effect and unity of tone, color and form.  Chardins compositions were balanced using granular impasto, shadows and the diffustion of light. Chardins work was very simplistic and humble never containing hidden messages or meanings.

Chardin often viewed and admired things as if he were seeing them first time. His work shows us that there is charm, beauty and character to be found in simplistic every day objects. With his paintings he is able to touch the viewer so that they can see beauty from a perspective which is often is taken for granted.

I really like how Chardin used domestic objects repedidely throughout his paintings. As you can see below In Basket of Wild Strawberries he uses what looks to be the same glass in a very similar arrangement to Glass of Water and Coffee Pot.

The piece which I would like to focus on is the one on the right and below, titled Glass of Water and Coffee Pot.

   At first glance one might say this painting is rather plain, dreary and,or boring. However upon a closer look there is much more to it than one might expect.   As a painter myself I found Chardins techniques to be quite interesting.  First he primed his canvas with variations of brown paint, sometimes he tinted the shades of brown with red or green, thus giving him a neutral under-painting or background.  He would then start his painting by brushing on the darkest tones, then the middle-tones, and finally the highlights. He would only add color after he saw the correct tonal balance of the under-painting.  Finally he would complete the painting by going over it again, in order to create reflections and highlights unifying the composition.   As you can see in the example above, the same white pigment that he used for the cloves of garlic was used to convey reflections on the glass as well as the soft highlights on the coffee pot. I love the heart shaped reflection of the garlic on the upper right corner of the glass.  The ranges of browns used throughout the painting are tied together by a subtle hint of the green used for the foliage of the garlic.

            Something which the average person would not see or notice at first glance is that the glass and coffee pot are both the same shape.  However, the shape of one is an upside down mirror image of the other. The placement or juxtaposition of these objects creates an interesting dialogue between their shapes.  This visual exchange continues through other elements as well, the glass is light, transparent, smooth and reflective, while the coffee pot is dark, opaque, rough and charred. The details of these objects are carefully placed in order to be equally balanced. The handle of the coffee pot and the glass from the water level up are both on the same picture plane horizontally. In order to give you a better idea of what I am talking about, below there is an image which shows an example of the lines and shapes.

        Chardin builds up the visual elements by using the harmonious and contrasting textures of the individual pieces. Compositional balance was important to Chardin as well, the tonal values of the glass and the coffee pot contrast nicely with the background. The gradation of the background from dark on the right to light on the left results in a contrast of all the objects: the glass and garlic look brighter against its dark background while the coffee pot looks darker as its background becomes lighter.  Chardin used the soft forms of the garlic to break up the hard geometric shapes of the containers, and the long horizontal line of the surface which they all sit upon; resulting in an illusion of more frontal space.

As with many things in life sometimes it takes another persons perspective for one to appreciate simplistic beauty.  At first I didn’t see it, however after studying this piece, I find great beauty in this composition.  The glass is clean, simplistic and transparent, it holds one of the most important sustaining staples of life, water.  The dirty charred, coffee pot on the other hand is solid, and opaque which encourages the viewer to believe that it may conseal something or nothing at all. The composition is beautifully set off by the organic shape and origin of the garlic cloves. As I gain more knowledge about art and the techniques used to convey the images depicted, I am amazed at how illusions are achieved.

References

1. http://www.cmoa.org/searchcollections/details.aspx?item=1012206
2. http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/great-works/chardin-jeanbaptiste-simon-glass-of-water-and-coffee-pot-1760-798010.html

3. http://www.visual-arts-cork.com/old-masters/chardin-jean.htm