Lynn Talbot’s paintings seductively juxtapose realistic, small-scale still lifes with formal shapes and text. Talbot’s technique and imagery recalls 17th-century Dutch and 16th-century Spanish painters (such as Willem Kalf, Gerrit Willemsz. Heda and Francisco de Zurbaran), as well as the tradition of American still life and trompe l’oeil painting by artists such as William Harnett and Raphaelle Peale. Rather than viewing the history of painting as baggage to be overcome, Talbot uses historical painting techniques to her advantage by contrasting earlier still life motifs against more recent aspects of formal abstraction. Talbot makes the still life genre new and her own in her compositions.