Framing Space

In this painting by Pannell, a new compositional clarity emerges from the artist’s earlier explorations of all-encompassing floral fields. Whereas previous works dissolved spatial depth in favour of immersive chromatic planes, often using ambiguous stacked or aerial perspectives, this painting marks a notable development. Here, the still life structure is more defined: a rustic wooden table holds a white jug brimming with flowers, and beneath it, a tightly tucked chair creates a visual tension between presence and absence, intimacy and distance.

The choice to anchor the composition in the formal language of still life painting aligns Pannell’s work with historical references, particularly the Dutch vanitas tradition, where flowers often served as symbols of transience and beauty. Yet unlike traditional memento mori, which tend to overwhelm with symbolic overdetermination, this work resists didacticism. Instead, the objects serve as containers of space, simultaneously grounding the scene and complicating its spatial logic. The table and jug take up the full pictorial plane in a way that feels both practical and staged, used yet uninhabited. The chair’s presence, half-visible and half-consumed by the lower frame, reinforces this ambivalence, as if someone has just left, or is yet to arrive.

What remains most compelling is the treatment of space and surface. The softly modulated wall behind the still life flattens the image while also hinting at a subtle spatial recession, aided by the vertical brushwork and tonal variation. This creates a push-pull dynamic reminiscent of Hans Hofmann’s spatial theories, though rendered here with a muted tonal palette and controlled precision. The result is a painting that feels at once calming and slightly uncanny, familiar yet suspended. It suggests a deepening of Pannell’s engagement with interiority, not only in spatial terms but as a psychological or affective state