Bizarre High Tea 2015
Contemporary - Fine Art Photography by Niki Hill
Each “Still Life” setting is made up of intricately constructed “Objet d’Art” that are researched with particular ideas in mind.
In this project I fashion the still life subjects in the form of teapots, teacups and tiered plates from fresh flowers, vegetables, fish, animal skins and internal organs. Items are covered, stitched, moulded, and made to achieve the required look. Finally, the scene is set on a black background and digitally photographed in my lighting studio.
These visual vignettes take a fresh approach to the tradition of still-life paintings, which reflected the values of much earlier times; a simple group of objects from daily life, a bowl of fruit, a vase of flowers, celebrating the beauty of life’s abundance and indicating one’s wealth and position. A skull setting with a snuffed-out candle and timepieces warning of the transient nature of life and the importance of wise decision-making and prudent actions.
The work presented here, however, represents a contemporary approach to the Still Life genre, in which messages are nuanced and laden with the complexities of current cultural conversations, which blend traditional concerns with contemporary ideas and issues.
The High Tea theme is an ideal setting for the contemporary conversations that flow through my artwork. My cultural heritage is from colonial European settlers to New Zealand during Victorian times. These images reference the British genteel feminine tradition of afternoon tea with a bizarre surrealist twist. Art movements, the fairy tale genre, the poetry of spiritual love, conservation, scandal, and environmental concerns all inspire my ideas.
Title: Cinderella's Pumpkin Tea
Medium: C Type photography.
Limited edition of 10. (9 available)
Dimensions: 610 mm x 1220 mm
New Still Life Genre
This contemporary Still Life setting is intricately constructed, fresh from the artist's home garden in Tamaki Makaurau, Auckland, New Zealand. Celebrating the magic of nature’s cycles, capturing the delicate bloom and transformation of the pumpkin into a fairy tale teapot. The vibrant yellows and deep greens invite a curious butterfly, while the dark background makes every detail glow with life. This work brings a serene enchantment to your space, reminding you of Fairy tale magical endings, romantic love, the reversal of fortunes and realising one's dreams.
Title: Cinderella's Teapot
Medium: C Type photography.
Limited edition of 10. (9 available)
Dimensions: 500 mm x 720 mm
New Still Life Genre
As the title, Cinderella's Teapot, suggests, it is a whimsical fairy tale setting in which one could imagine a magical conversation between Cinderella and her Fairy Godmother before she goes to the Ball to meet the prince of her dreams.
Title: Romancing High Tea
Medium: C Type photography.
Limited edition of 10. (10 available)
Dimensions: 610 mm x 1220 mm
New Still Life Genre
This Camellia ice tea tableau is a contemporary approach to the traditional art of the Still Life or Nature Morté, taking the tradition of Ice Tea on a contemporary visual twist. It talks about love, life and the imminence of death, showing ornamental camellia flowers encapsulated in ice sculptures in the form of a teapot, teacups and a four-tier cake stand.
Title: Camellia Ice Tea
Medium: C Type photography.
Limited edition of 10. (10 available)
Dimensions: 500 mm x 720 mm
New Still Life Genre
This Camellia Ice Tea tableau is a contemporary approach to the traditional art of the Still Life or Nature Morté, taking the tradition of Ice Tea on a contemporary visual twist. It talks about love, life and imminence of death, showing ornamental camellia flowers encapsulated in ice sculptures in the form of a teapot, teacup and delicate courgette flower shapes.
Title: You are a flame in my heart
Medium: C Type photography.
Limited edition of 10. (10 available)
Dimensions: 720 mm x 500 mm
New Still Life Genre
You are a flame in my heart is a contemporary Still Life image made on a four-tier cake stand. Using the red Camellia and Courgette flower both fresh and frozen takes the viewer on a contemporary visual twist. Creating an altogether sumptuous visual delight.
Victorians used the language of flowers or Floriology as a means to communicate via decoding flowers and their meanings. The Red flowered Camellia: “You are a flame in my heart”.
Two top tiers - Camellia buds encapsulated in cupcake ice sculptures
Middle tier - Triple courgette flower shaped ice sculptures with camellia petals, fresh leaves and buds.
Lower tier - Camellia flowers are presented in full bloom alongside frozen flowers in thaw on the lower tier.
Title: Blush 1&2. Diptych
Medium: C Type photography.
Limited edition of 10. (10 available)
Dimensions: 720 mm x 500 mm (per piece)
New Still Life Genre
Blush 1 & 2 ( Diptych). This is a Still Life vignette that celebrates spiritual love. It is visual poetry that talks about the ephemeral nature of knowing you are loved. Those special fleeting moments to be savored and remembered. Taking the genteel feminine art of the High Tea conversation to a spiritual level.
Top tier - Pink roses and hand-made candles, made from roses dipped in wax.
Middle tier - Raw cut pieces of sugarcane, jasmine, rose hips and cypress leaves.
Lower tier - Pink and white roses and mangosteen.
Title: Afternoon tea in Fur
Medium: C Type photography.
Limited edition of 10. (10 available)
Dimensions: 720 mm x 500 mm
New Still Life Genre
This Still Life is a feast for the eyes. It features a teacup set on a black background, constructed from offal, orchids, animal fur, wishbones and human hair. The fur-lined cup is a reference to the Surrealist artist Méret Oppenheim and her 1936 objet d’art entitled ‘Breakfast in Fur’.
Title: Titbits
Medium: C Type photography.
Limited edition of 10. (9 available)
Dimensions: 500 mm x 720 mm
New Still Life Genre
A delicate morsel of food or a whisp of information.
Perhaps a scandal or a secret wish…….
Title: Afternoon tea in Honeycomb
Medium: C Type photography.
Limited edition of 10 (10 available)
Dimensions: 500 mm x 720 mm
New Still Life Genre
This Still Life is a parody on the conversations that might be had over a pot of tea.
It features a teapot constructed from honeycomb tripe and orchids. Tripe is synonymous with cheapness, rubbish, and nonsense. Ideas heard in conversations that might have one thinking “What a load of tripe”. Orchids on the other hand are said to embody love, beauty, refinement and are also the Chinese symbol for fertility.
Title: What about the one that got away?
Medium: C Type photography.
Limited edition of 10 (10 available)
Dimensions: 500 mm x 720 mm
New Still Life Genre
Daringly delicate and tantalising to see!
Top tier - Disrupting the taste buds, fishhooks formed into heart shapes atop frozen estuary mud cakes with snapper fins inset.
Lower tier – Snapper eyeballs decorate fresh sea ice cakes with fish scales and sand.
One considers swallowing all of this with much caution. Best consider a careful approach or it could leave a bad taste in the mouth.This is a bizarre Still Life with a contemporary cultural twist. The image has a powerful visceral impact floating on a black background.
The scene is set for a conversation about environmental issues (coastal and estuarine conservation efforts, fishing quotas, outmoded fishing practices, over-fishing) challenging our sensibilities to consider new ways to conserve global resources.
Title: What's that got to do with the price of fish?
Medium: C Type photography.
Limited edition of 10 (10 available)
Dimensions: 500 mm x 720 mm
New Still Life Genre
This Snapper teapot is a different kettle of fish from the genteel genre of feminine decorum of polite afternoon tea conversation. Moreover, it deals with the spiny unsettling conversation surrounding environmental issues, coastal and estuarine conservation efforts, fishing quotas, outmoded fishing practices and over-fishing. This is a contemporary Still Life that morphs itself around current conversations of both local and global concern, challenging our sensibilities to consider new ways to conserve global resources.
Title: There is something fishy going on.
Medium: C Type photography.
Limited edition of 10 (10 available)
Dimensions: 500 mm x 720 mm
New Still Life Genre
Freshly sutured snapper skin, fins and tails are fashioned into a Bizarre High Tea setting. The snapper skull and skeleton link us back to the traditional codes of the Still Life genre - warnings of death reminding us of the ephemeral nature of this world and the importance of wise decision-making and prudent actions.
This is a bizarre Still Life with a contemporary cultural twist.
This image has a powerful visceral impact floating on a black background. The scene is set for a conversation about environmental issues (fishing quotas, outmoded fishing practices, over-fishing) challenging our sensibilities to consider new ways to conserve global resources.
Title: Mad Trappers Tea Party 1.
Medium: C Type photography.
Limited edition of 10 (10 available)
Dimensions: 500 mm x 720 mm
New Still Life Genre
The title, Mad Trapper’s Tea Party makes a link to the “Mad Hatter’s Tea Party” from the story of “Alice in Wonderland”11 from fantasy literary genre. This, however, is a twisted take on the traditional ideas of Still Life that depict dead animals hung or laid out, showing the wealth and bounty of the land. Mad Trapper’s Tea Party is an uncanny Still Life that reveals a teapot dressed in rabbit skin and ears. Ferns and moss grow from the centre of this peculiar pot with its handle and spout made from ferns. Four toadstools nestle centre stage with a single Kereru tail feather on a bed of moss and ferns. A teacup lined with possum fur and ears alert to odd whispers, sits stage right of a fallen Monarch butterfly.
This is a New Zealand gothic tale about introduced species of animals for the purpose of trapping for fur and game in colonial times. However, due to the favourable climate and abundant natural resources, the possum and rabbit populations have boomed over the years and no amount of trapping and game shooting of these animals can keep up with their ability to breed. They have taken over the natural order and now sit firmly embedded in New Zealand culture as the pesky imposters.
Conversations and political debates abound as to how best we control these rogue rodents without compromising the native environment.
Title: Mad Trappers Tea Party 2.
Medium: C Type photography.
Limited edition of 10 (10 available)
Dimensions: 500 mm x 720 mm
New Still Life GenreThe title, Mad Trapper’s Tea Party makes a link to the “Mad Hatter’s Tea Party” from the story of “Alice in Wonderland” from literary fantasy genre. Confusion and wonderment abound in this tale.
This is a nonsensical Still Life featuring a teacup lined with possum fur and ears that are pricked to attention over the foreground Monarch butterfly. Moss and fern staged growing in the furry cup. Four toadstools line up nodding to the fallen one. The whole scene floats in the dark on a cloud of ferny moss.
This scene puts a peculiar twist on the traditional ideas of Still Life that depict dead animals hung or laid out, showing the wealth and bounty of the land. This is a New Zealand tale about introduced species of animals for the purpose of trapping for fur and game in colonial times. However, due to the favourable climate and abundant natural resources, the possum population has boomed over the years and no amount of trapping and game shooting of these animals can keep up with their ability to breed. They have taken over natural order and now it sits firmly embedded in New Zealand culture as the pesky imposter.
Conversations and political debates abound as to how best we control these rogue rodents without compromising the native environment.
Contact
Niki Hill
Phone: 0274740532
Email: nicolasimpkinhill@gmail.com
Beach Haven, Auckland
New Zealand
