Charles Bell (1935-1995)

Charles Bell's hyperrealist modern still lifes glean inspiration from America's enchantment with toys and arcade games, instilling a distinctive monumentality in playful, familiar objects. A rapt student of realist painting technique, Bell--who admired the work of Dutch master Johannes Vermeer, and studied under Salvador Dali--used this expertise to infuse his magical paintings with their exceptional, glowing color and astonishing depth.
In Bell's fantastic world, wind-up dolls, pinball machines, roller-skates, candy, and peanuts are painted with the punctiliousness and expressive luminosity of an Old-Master still life. Bell worked from his own carefully constructed photographs, for which groupings of objects were painstakingly arranged to catch the light just-so. Triple Swirl Fade to Black is a lustrous composition of children's marbles--one of Bell's most favored subjects--which glow like precious gemstones on a glittering, mirrored surface, reflecting, refracting and diffusing light within their kaleidoscopic depths. Bell's celebration of their colorful, whirling patterns and never belies their sense of objectivity; he presents their smooth, iridescent curved surfaces with affectionate and meticulous detail.