La Zorra by Jose Lopez Vergara

In this pyramidal arrangement, the circle of life is evident. There is no life without death and vice-versa. For me, the beauty of this piece resides in the imagination of the viewer.

This was the first still life I completed at the Angel Academy of Art in Florence. It is the first fully finished painting I ever made with a full-color palette. 

To make this composition I used an African knife my mother brought me from one of her trips to Egypt. It is a piece of sharpened and rusty iron attached to the horn of an antelope. I also used a real fox scarf I bought in Madrid in a small antique store. The owner of the store had two pelts at a very affordable price, but I chose the one that had both eyes and the tail. He told me it was a female fox, hence the name of the painting. I got the roses in Florence, and the little skull is a rabbit I bought at the supermarket. I cleaned the rabbit skull at home, and my girlfriend made a delicious rabbit soup with the rest of the body, which we ate before I started the painting. 

Whenever I look at this painting, sometimes I see a real fox resting on a rock and sometimes it is the pelt I bought in Madrid. Strangely enough, the fox is alive and thinking about her next meal in both cases.