Sweet Apple III – Mixed Media on Canvas (00027)

Sweet Apple III is a mixed-media work on canvas in which a solitary apple—wrapped in a turquoise ribbon and resting on a white oval plate—becomes the vehicle for a continuous exploration of matter and surface. The image is set within a dense and layered field of texture: golden marks, black shadows, and horizontal strokes accumulate around the central object without ever dissolving into a simple background. The result is a still life where the familiar motif is destabilized by the weight of its own material environment.

Mandiola treats the canvas as both support and subject: oil, charcoal, and impasto coexist, each with its own optical logic and surface presence. The bluish-green of the ribbon introduces the only sharp chromatic note in a field dominated by earth tones and black, providing the apple with its visual anchor. This work belongs to a series in which everyday objects are subjected to sustained material attention, emerging transformed: strange, heavy, and absolutely present.

The image combines lightness and solemnity: the apple is domestic and common, yet the surface through which it is presented conveys the full accumulated force of Mandiola’s practice. A unique, handmade work. Ideal for collectors of contemporary Latin American painting.