Massachusetts still life painter Ted Polomis appears to craft the arrangements of objects for his compositions with as much care and skill as he paints them.
His subjects include vintage metal and wooden toys, the time-worn surfaces of which he renders with intimate fidelity, and “classic objects”, vases, glassware, fruit and vegetables, painted with exacting finesse.
One is tempted to label Polomis as a “realist”, but such labels tend to shut our eyes rather than open them. In his apparently faithful rendering there is an affection, an emotional dimension to his appreciation of the objects he paints.
To me there is an emphasis on the “still” in “still life” in Polomis’ work, with a sense of stopped time. He extends an invitation to engage the objects in a contemplative way, lingering on the simultaneously soft and sharply defined edge of a fruit, looking more deeply into the reflections on a glassy vase, or seeking out the negative shapes carved out of the background by the objects in his arrangements.
The color harmonies of his compositions are also notable, and obviously the result of careful thought. Serene blues are set off with bright oranges; golds, greens and grays are laid gently against one another; and white objects, notoriously difficult to handle, are given a muted sheen of color, a range of subtitles within the surface tones.
