Vanitas II: Memento Mori Saskia Ozols. Oil on Panel, 24″ x 12″ 2024
This painting is the second in a series of Vanitas Paintings that I am currently working on. The paintings explore the relationship between the material and the spiritual through the use of symbolic objects. Traditionally this genre was used in history for meditation on mortality, materiality, and meaning.
Currently I am working with techniques from both American realism of the late 19th century as well as Flemish oil painting from the 14th-17th centuries.
The paintings are all from direct observation and include layers of Alla Prima paint application between veils of translucent glazing. All paintings in this series are done with oil paint on specially prepared wooden panels.
Saskia Ozols
In these works, I have contrasted antique and contemporary objects for the same end: to provide opportunity for contemplation on cycles of life alongside questions of mortality, ethics, and balance between intellectual or material pursuits.
Memento Mori paintings address the relationship between life and death. In this painting, I contrasted the skull with a branch of bougainvillea from my garden as well as a found feather. The relationship between the three forms I chose for this composition connect life, thoughts on afterlife, and the re-growth. The vertical composition creates a movement upward for contemplation on the relationship between microcosm and macrocosm.
The series will be exhibited in a group exhibition at Gryder Gallery in New Orleans’ Arts District. Part of the summer celebration of art on White Linen Night, The exhibition will open with a reception on August 3rd, 2024.
