Apples in a Bag - by Darren Maurer

12" x 12"

I like paintings that look realistic yet when you look close you can see the brush strokes. This piece definitely fits that description perfectly. I wanted this painting to be more about the plastic bag rather than the apples. The apple to the right is painted loosely with very soft edges. The one to the left has a soft edge and a hard edge. The way a painter handles edges in a painting helps control where the focal point will be. Our eyes tend to look at hard edges first which is also how we see things. When you are looking at an object during the day the object will be in focus but things around it outside of your focal point are a little fuzzy. The top edge of the bag is a hard edge in addition to being a high contrast area. My eye goes directly to the top edge of the bag first and then follows down to the apples. This was a fun one to paint.