Jitka Brynjolffsen introduced us to the world of still life, a genre that can trace its root in painting to the ancient Egyptians and on through the Greeks and the Romans, the Dutch Renaissance and to the Impressionists and Post Impressionists. She presented the Basket of Fruit by Caravaggio, c. 1599, as the acme of still life painting.
Her selection of photographers working with still life subjects included W. H. Fox Talbot, Roger Fenton, Andre Kertesz, Paul Outerbridge, Josef Sudek, Robert Mapplethorpe, Irving Penn, Sharon Core, Ori Gersht and Martin Parr. It is used widely in advertising. Popular subjects are flowers, art objects and food and drink (peppers are iconic).
It’s attraction for photographers derives in part from the ability to be in total control, of subject, composition, framing, lighting and colour. It is possible to play with reflections, inversions, refractions, polarising light and black grounds.