Sold for: $73,250

PROVENANCE
Equinox Gallery, Vancouver, 2002
Private Collection, Regina

LITERATURE
Ray Cronin et al., Mary Pratt, Art Gallery of Nova Scotia and The Rooms, 2013, page 115

Mary Pratt’s extraordinary Realist works cause the viewer to consider the nature of what we see. Pratt used photographs as the basis for her paintings, as she was fascinated by the ephemeral nature of light, expressed masterfully in works like our stunning Peaches Flaming in Crystal. Ray Cronin wrote that “reality is both a concrete and a mutable subject, something we think we can grasp but that all too often is in the eye of the beholder.” Pratt crystallizes the fluid moment, making visible the ephemeral – enabling us to study and absorb its subtle nuances over a duration of time. She stated that she chose to paint images that were beautiful to her, and this painting certainly is, with its exquisite treatment of refracted light. Tendrils of this light bend and flow from the crystal bowl out over the table, then extend into the ether and off the edge of the picture plane. Hot red, gold and orange tones dominate, and Pratt counterpoints transparency with solidity. In the stunning Peaches Flaming in Crystal, Pratt has given us an evocative illusion of the peaches simmering in a fusion of the elements of fire and air.

All prices are in Canadian Dollars