Sharon Core: Early American

In 2007, SHARON CORE came across the work of the early 19th century American still life painter Raphaelle Peale. Peale’s still lifes of fruit, cakes, and vegetables are characterized by an uncanny lifelikeness, a strange animation of natures mortes, an American austerity, and a sense of non-identity, a giving over of a signature hand of the artist in favor of a minute replication of reality. 

Core began a series of photographs titled Early American, in part due to an affinity with Peale’s work, and also because of her interest in examining the ideas surrounding illusionism and trompe l’oeil, and their relationship with photography. Core studied Peale’s paintings intensively through reproductions and tried to replicate as best as possible the lighting, subject matter, and compositional tendencies. 

Core recounts, “I researched and collected period porcelain and glass and grew, from heirloom seeds, varieties of fruits and vegetables in existence in the early 19th century. Through these efforts I hoped to achieve a mirroring of Peale’s painstaking painting process, and the themes that lie under their surfaces.” 

Much of the meaning of the photographs lies in the gaps between the originals and copies. These differences in time, place, and technologies point towards themes of cultural memory, nostalgia and loss, and ask questions about our perception of the American past.