Mary Calengor is known for her highly detailed realism painted in oil on linen and canvas.  There is amazing detail in her art along with an intuitive sense of how she captures the light on her subjects.  This painting is entitled, “Weaver’s Work”.  The colors and the detail in the weaving and the basket are amazing!  Simply spectacular!

Mary says of this painting:

The blanket in this painting was woven by a man named Shyamji in Gujarat India.  He is passionate about his process of dying and weaving and works tirelessly to keep the Indian hand weaving tradition relevant.  The basket comes from a group of artisans in the Buhera region in the eastern part of Zimbabwe.  It is a study in simplicity, yet it is so beautiful and interesting in all of its imperfection.  I wanted to do a painting of a woven textile, something fluid and colorful, different from the structure and monotone colors of the baskets I have painted.  This blanket had such beautiful colors, interesting weave, and the added bonus of the wonderful tassels, I knew it would be perfect.  Needless to say, a basket made it into the composition as well and I had the best of both worlds to paint.