Arrangement of two objects in a rusty metal box. found objects, plastic ball core, rusted metal fragment

Wedge and White Hemisphere, 1999


4"x5" format, gelatin-silver print, 48.4 x 32.6 cm.  (id#680) 

Arrangement of various small objects in a rough, compartmented wooden box meant for sewing articles. found objects, bandage tape, clay, paint residue, aluminum foil, acrylic medium, dried rubber cement

Specimen Box, 1998


4"x5" format, gelatin-silver print, 48.4 x 33.0 cm.  (id#636)

Arrangement of several transparent objects in an old wooden wall shelf with a mirrored back. found objects, Iceland schist, rock crystal, salt shaker, light bulb, alcohol lamp, heliometer, paperweight

Allegory (Mirror Shelf), 2000


4"x5" format, gelatin-silver print, 36.5 x 39.8 cm.  (id#694) 

Arrangement of five found objects, including a bird feeder, a triangular ruler, and a baseball, in a wooden box meant for keeping carpenter's tools.

Carpenter's Box, 2001


4"x5" format, gelatin-silver print, 19.0 x 48.1 cm.  (id#749)

Arrangement of three objects in a metal box meant as a base for a planter or for a number of potted plants. found objects, soapstone dish, skyrocket fragment, flotation ring, rubber ball, planter

Chakras, 1997 


4"x5" format, gelatin-silver print, 48.2 x 36.8 cm.  (id#605) 

Arrangement of four objects - a fishbone, a wishbone, a metal washer, and a piece of wood from an oriental fan - in a long, deep wooden box.

Fishbone, Wishbone, and Ring, 2000


4"x5" format, gelatin-silver print, 22.6 x 48.4 cm.  (id#729) 

Arrangement of numerous found objects in a silverware tray. soap bar, water purifying pellets, stone, bicycle gear, spiral earring, wire, rubber ball, flotation ring, earphone earpiece, coffeemaker gasket, abrasive disc

Untitled (Arrangement in Silverware Tray), 2000


4"x5" format, gelatin-silver print, 17" x 15"  (id#717) 

Arrangement of eight or ten objects - in a wooden tray. found objects, silver spoon, mop head, broom head, scrub brush, shoe horn, bone
Triptych (Altarpiece), 2001



4"x5" format, gelatin-silver print, 24.6 x 48.1 cm.  (id#746)


One of many images partly inspired by the grisaille tradition in liturgical painting.

Arrangement of five objects - in a wooden carpenter's toolbox. found objects, baseball, horseshoe, plumb, wooden pyramid, pump rotator

Toolbox with Baseball, Horseshoe, and Plumb, 2000


4"x5" format, gelatin-silver print, 48.3 x 25.4 cm.  (id#700) 

Arrangement of five objects - in a wooden carpenter's toolbox. found objects, kumquats, honey dipper, honey dripper, ice cube tray, prophylactic, sugar candy, skyrocket fragment

Kumquats (Still Life with Honey Dipper), 2001


4"x5" format, gelatin-silver print, 33.9 x 48.3 cm.  (id#750) 

Arrangement of five objects - wooden painter's color box, found objects, metal spike, switch cover, soap bar, hyposulfite crystal, dried artist's paint, paper pulp, plastic tube, skyrocket fragment, toy balloon, lamp base

Arrangement in Paint Tray, 2000


4"x5" format, gelatin-silver print, 36.0 x 47.5 cm.  (id#721) 

Arrangement of two objects - in a wooden cupboard. found objects, flatbread, irrigation base

Cabinet with Crescent and Disc, 2000


4"x5" format, gelatin-silver print, 38.8 x 37.1 cm.  (id#713) 

Arrangement of several objects in a drainboard tray. found objects, dowels, rusty metal strip, beeswax, soap, wooden blocks, coffee grounds

Diptych (Arrangement with Beeswax IV), 2000


4"x5" format, gelatin-silver prints, 31.2x47 cm. x2 (id#742LR)

Arrangement of several objects in a drainboard tray. found objects, dowels, rusty metal strip, beeswax, coffee grounds

Diptych (Arrangement with Beeswax IV, left panel), 2000


4"x5" format, gelatin-silver prints, 31.2x47 cm. (id#742L)

Arrangement of several objects in a drainboard tray. found objects, beeswax, soap, wooden blocks, coffee grounds

Diptych (Arrangement with Beeswax IV, right panel), 2000


4"x5" format, gelatin-silver prints, 31.2x47 cm. (id#742R)

Arrangement of three objects in a shallow wooden fruit crate, found objects, paint residue, acrylic medium, water purifying pellets

Triad with Discs and Rectangle, 1999


4"x5" format, gelatin-silver print, 48.3 x 29.4 cm.  (id#688) 

Arrangement of four objects in a plastic organizing tray, found objects, Christmas balls, rubber ball

Untitled (Spheres), 1998


4"x5" format, gelatin-silver print, 47.9 x 33.0 cm.  (id#633) 

Arrangement of pork ribs in a shallow wooden box, lined with pages of a text written in an Indian language. found object, ribs, paper
Ribs in Long Box, 1998



4"x5" format, gelatin-silver print, 29.7 x 48.4 cm.  (id#638)

The sheets of printed paper under the ribs come from a sort of moral or religious tract on the categories of punishment, written in I don't know what language of India.  I only know the subject due to an occasional phrase in English, such as "Retributive Punishment" or "Deterrent Punishment".

Arrangement of squirrel skulls and chicken bones in a shallow wooden box. found objects, skulls, bones, squirrels, dried round tree fruit, polystyrene

Bones Mandala, 1999


4"x5" format, gelatin-silver print, 38.0 x 48.3 cm.  (id#664)

These are squirrel skulls, arranged in a ring.  My father used to trap squirrels - though I don't mean to suggest that he was some sort of mountain man, making his living on the frontier, collecting animal skins for city folk.  He was a suburban Long Islander who wanted to protect his flower bulbs from predation.  He trapped them, drowned them, and tossed them on our compost heap.  (Our yard must have been a sort of black hole of squirreldom; as soon as they got too close, they got sucked in and disappeared.)  A few years later they were fertilizing our garden.  By then the skulls were nice and clean, and I collected them for my photography, hoping to immortalize them in some way.

Arrangement of numerous objects in a shallow wooden tray. found objects, corn cobs, toy sword, paint residue, macramé, raccoon skull, shoe liner

Arrangement with Sword, Corncobs, and Skull, 1998


4"x5" format, gelatin-silver print, 48.4 x 29.7 cm. (id#646)

This skull was from a raccoon. (See note to previous photo, "Bones Mandala".)


I don't have any human skulls in my "collection" of objects for still life (only the one I still use on occasion).  Many years ago, however, I was able to make a charcoal drawing or two of a human skull: a housemate was studying medicine, and he had obtained a skull to help him learn anatomy.  He showed it to me, and I held in my hands what I had presumed was a replica, made with just the right shade of pale yellow plastic. But no, the detailing was too good to be a copy, and the thing just didn't feel like plastic.


Some years before this, in a life drawing class at Columbia University, there was a skeleton positioned on a stand. We were to draw from this instead of from the usual human model.  During the break I went up to take a closer look. On one of the ribs there was a sticker with the name and address of a lady in Buffalo.

Arrangement of numerous objects in a shallow rusty barbecue. found objects, iron, rust, bolt, wires, gas cartridges

Rusty Metal Box, 1998


4"x5" format, gelatin-silver print, 48.4 x 32.6 cm.  (id#645) 

Arrangement of numerous objects in a shallow wooden box. found objects, gas cartridges, plastic tray, sandpaper, earrings, soap bar, pumice stone, copper wire, drilled wooden block, hatchet blade sheath

Arcimboldo's Leer (Window Light), 1997


4"x5" format, gelatin-silver print, 47.8 x 29.0 cm.  (id#607)


This is my only still-life in which I tried to hint at a sort of face-like arrangement, a little like the great Arcimboldo.  I didn't want to go too far with this, however; it would have seemed corny.

Arrangement of numerous objects in a shallow wooden box. found objects, rose twigs, thorns, mushrooms, gauze, feathers, fabric, flower parts, aralia berries

Tray with Seeds and Thorns, 1997


4"x5" format, gelatin-silver print, 37.3 x 47.3 cm.  (id#612) 

Arrangement of numerous objects in a shallow wooden box. found objects, cuttlebones, wire brush, whittled wood, clothespins, hearing aid form, copper wire, pencil shavings, paint residue, clay, wire, acrylic medium

Arrangement with Cuttlebones, 1997


4"x5" format, gelatin-silver print, 48.3 x 24.8 cm.  (id#614)

Arrangement of numerous slips of numbered paper within a baroque-style plastic frame in a shallow wooden box. found objects, alcatraz, numbers

Alcatraz Baroque, 1998


4"x5" format, gelatin-silver print, 45.8 x 37.7 cm.  (id#656) 

Arrangement of numerous objects in a shallow wooden box. found objects, watercolor tablets, hub protector, blood, lymph

Watercolors, 2001


4"x5" format, gelatin-silver print, 33.9 x 48.5 cm.  (id#743)

Prime Arrangements, 1997-2001


A selection of still-life photographs composed for the view camera from 1997 to 2001.


These images exist in limited editions of fifteen signed and numbered prints of any size and any type of print, whether traditional analog silver-gelatin prints or digital pigment prints.  They consist principally of gelatin-silver prints (as they were made when I still routinely made traditional prints and had not yet adopted the use of a digital pigment printer), sized mainly to a format of 16" x 20" or 11" x 14".  Because I generally did not complete the editions in gelatin-silver, I have begun to fill them out with most images by making digital pigment prints in A3Plus, not to exceed a total of fifteen.  For example, of "Toolbox with Baseball, Horseshoe, and Plumb" (id#700), I already have nine signed and numbered gelatin-silver prints, and in recent years have made three digital pigment prints, so I can make only three more pigment prints.


For an artist's statement regarding these images, see the last menu item in this section, "The Persistence of Memory - Still-Life Essay". 


© 2014 Allen Schill.  All rights reserved.  No part of this document may be reproduced or used without prior written permission from the author. Anyone is welcome to link to it, or to quote brief passages, but I would like to be notified.

© Copyright Allen Schill

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