Still Life With Green Soup

Emma Shapiro
Fernando Botero, Still Life with Green Soup, 1972
By EMMA SHAPIRO

The Soup of Venus
By James Tate

This soup is cold
and it needs something
you probably didn't follow
the recipe, you were
in a hurry and wanted
to surprise me.
That was sweet of you
but you forgot
and I don't like
cold soup.
You might try adding
one bay leaf
while you are in there.
The salt is on the table
and I will experiment
with that myself.
The parsley doesn't 
taste much but it
does improve
the appearance.
You used to make
such good soup.
I always bragged
about your soup.
I think that's what
originally attracted me
to you, that hot soup
you used to make.
I loved that soup.
Do you still have
that recipe?
Well this tastes
a little better now,
lukewarm soup
is my second favorite.

Editor's Note: Students were asked to match a poem of their choice with a painting of their choice. The relationship between the two shall be determined by the viewer/reader.

  • 7:00 AM

Still Life with Green Soup

Fernando Botero
Fernando Botero, Still Life with Green Soup, 1972
By MELISA CAPAN

 Mi amor y Bengal bella, Dolce,

It’s almost as if Fernando Botero made this for you… Naturaleza Muerta con Sopa Verde es mi regalo para ti.

This particular cat embodies Botero’s signature style of “Boterismo,” just as you will while I continue to feed you fancy feast twice a day. Trust me your future sinuous form will only enhance your sublime enchantment. Even 1970s cats of surrealism gallop across dinner tables in search of a little taste. Alas, forgive me if you believe me to be calling you chubby or fat… You are simply voluminous! Botero says,

“What I say is that they are not fat, but voluminous. If I make a fruit, a landscape, an animal, a man, anything, it is a deformation to exalt volume. So I do not see them as fat, but as voluminous. Fat can also be Michelangelo, Masaccio or all Florentine art that is voluminous.”

Botero brings intense color and volume to every day activities in Latin America. He fattens is characters to give them the sensuality of form. Figures are painted lightly in the center and then darkened around the edges thereby altering the laws of perspective. So, Dolce, please continue your love for fancy feast and mischievous adventures on my dinner table… Your form remains purrrfect to me.

Meow. Meow. Tal vez este es el destino. Mi gatita voluminoso, este pintor colombiano hizo esta obra de arte para ti.

 Editor's Note: Students were asked to give a painting to someone or something they cared for. These are their moving responses.
  • 7:00 AM