From the film-maker:

On viewing this painting what attracted me to it was the colour palette. My first thought was how much the light and colour reminded me of Caravaggio’s work, an artist I find very dramatic.

I was then taken by the challenge of making a film that incorporated not only the aesthetic of the painting but also some sort of story element. I wanted to take on the challenge of developing a narrative story from a still life.

On researching Courbet himself, and his life in relation to this work and his other works, I decided to undertake an embellished fictitious biography using this painting as the manifestation of his resolve in developing the realist movement in art.

Ben Caird

A piece inspired by Gustave Courbet, Still Life with Apples and a Pomegranate, 1871-2