Back in the Saddle

So I was working on painting an onion this evening, and had an interesting experience amidst the vapors and the mess. I was working on a small, sparkly highlight on a part of the onion's translucent skin. At that moment, while admiring the onion and making a little mark on the panel, I felt this kinship with all the Dutch still life painters who did that work so long ago. Not to say that this little piece looks like anything like a Pieter Claesz... just that some things don't change much from era to era, such as how lovely onions are, and how much fun it is to paint them. Which reminds me of this Robert Henri passage that I like a lot:

"The object of painting a picture is not to make a picture - however unreasonable this may sound. The picture, if a picture results, is a by-product and may be useful, valuable, interesting as a sign of what has past. The object, which is back of every true work of art, is the attainment of a state of being, a state of high functioning, a more than ordinary moment of existence... These results, however crude, become dear to the artist who made them because they are records of states of being which he has enjoyed and which he would regain. They are likewise interesting to others because they are to some extent readable and reveal the possibilities of greater existence."