On a recent drive down to an Oregon Bach Festival concert in Mt. Angel I passed fields of blueberries and strawberries, orchards filled with cherry, pear, and apple trees, and fruit stands proclaiming that Oregon’s fruit harvest was there for the buying. On the wall of one such stand outside of Woodburn, hand-painted fruit loomed large in a straw basket collapsing under the weight of the harvest. It was a rural roadside still life.
Artists have been filling fruit bowls and baskets, alongside pitchers and vases, atop tables and on chopping boards for centuries. Arcimboldo represented facial features with fruits (and vegetables); fruit was a favorite subject in Picasso’s Cubist period. But the visual arts do not hold exclusive claim to the beauty and significance of fruit. Songwriters have sung of lemon trees and blueberries; Steinbeck used grapes in metaphor and children’s authors “count” on fruit to delight their young readers…