BEING IN ITALY gives us access to amazing works of art from the Renaissance Masters, the Romans, even the Etruscans… Not just in museums and churches, but also in the private homes, courtyards and gardens we visit during my Tuscany photography workshop. Paintings are rich with the symbolisms of their age, many which have continued to trickle down into our time, and still strike a deep cord within us. One of these themes, very popular in painting as well as photography is the STILL LIFE. Beyond just being a pretty, well composed, or dramatically lit tabletop scene, the objects chosen to be represented can have a deeper, extra, or even secret meaning that is hidden within the image.

CORTONA STILL LIFE – © Robin Davis
Cortona, Italy is the perfect setting for inspiring us, with golden light through medieval windows, and for shopping at the lush and beautiful fruit markets. However don’t touch the fruit! Just point and the vendor will bag it for you.

Fruit is a common symbol of abundance and the seasonal (and fleeting) bounty of the earth, like the cornucopia/horn of plenty from ancient Roman Art, that’s also found in American Thanksgiving harvest themes of prosperity. Each fruit has it’s own meaning as well.

Apples get a bad rap, considering that one led to the expulsion of mankind from the Garden of Eden, but they, as well as pears are connected to the goddess, symbols of the feminine side of the deity from ancient times. Grapes, the vine, and grape leaves relate to the bonds of family, and also prosperity, abundance and plenty. Plums represent the sensuousness of the good life.

Feng Shui uses fruit symbolism to draw peace, prosperity and good luck into the home. Apples are health and harmony, grapes are abundance and material wealth, peaches are the fruit of heaven and immortality, pomegranates are fertility, oranges and citrus ward off bad energy.

All of the effects in this image are done entirely in camera and are some of the techniques that I teach in my Cortona Center of Photography Italy workshops.  In fact, this shot was set up and created for my students during one of our lesson demonstrations during the Italy photo course. The assignment was to create a photographic image in camera, inspired by a Renaissance painting.

I’ve printed this image with archival inks on watercolor paper and also canvas for a painterly effect and it’s one of my favorites, hanging as a symbol of plenty in my kitchen.

For a limited edition archival print on 13×19 paper: http://www.thethirdeyephoto.com/shop/

To learn more about my Tuscany photo workshop classes that I will hold in Summer and Fall this year, visit www.cortonacenter.com.

all text and images ©Robin Davis