The Art of Contemplation - Original Painting by Collette Fergus
The Art of Contemplation – Original Pop Art Painting for Sale
The Art of Contemplation is an original contemporary artwork by New Zealand artist Collette Fergus, available for purchase. This striking piece blends surrealism with bold, expressive colour and subtle cubist influences, drawing on Collette’s recognisable Boozehag-inspired style with a refined, reflective edge.
What is this pop art artwork about?
The painting depicts a poised woman seated in a high-back chair, holding a beautifully crafted cocktail. Dressed in a soft blue dress and white cardigan, her retro hairstyle and composed posture evoke a sense of nostalgia and quiet elegance. Behind her, a clock drifts apart, a symbolic exploration of time slowing, dissolving, and losing its grip during moments of deep contemplation.
An open bottle resting on a shelf hints at indulgence and introspection, while flowers beside her introduce themes of beauty, transience, and emotional growth. The surreal composition invites the viewer to pause, reflect, and interpret the narrative through their own lived experience.
Here’s a compelling and evocative back-story for The Art of Contemplation that you can use on your website, social media, or in an artist statement — written in a way that speaks to your voice as a contemporary New Zealand artist with your distinctive colourful, surreal, Boozehag-influenced style: (Collette)
Back-Story: The Art of Contemplation
She came to me one slow Sunday afternoon, a vision caught between a sigh and a smile. A woman seated with poise, draped in a soft blue dress and white cardigan, hair curled just so, holding a cocktail not for celebration, but for reflection. In her gaze was a story that felt familiar, like a half-remembered lyric that floats around the edges of consciousness.
This painting began as a meditation on time and stillness. Behind her, a clock dissolves, its hands and numbers drifting apart like fragments of a dream waking into day. Time here isn’t linear; it’s felt, tasted, and held. Maybe that’s why the clock seems to unravel… because in moments of deep thought, the ticking of the world outside fades, leaving only the pulse of memory and imagination.
On the shelf beside her sits an open bottle, a quiet nod to indulgence, to pauses taken and choices pondered. Flowers beside her, in full bloom, whisper of beauty in transience, growth even in suspended moments. The cocktail she cradles isn’t just a drink; it’s a ritual object, a symbol of celebration, melancholy, desire, and repose, all at once.
Visually, the piece bridges worlds. Bold, expressive colour, a hallmark of my work that often marries whimsy with sharp emotional resonance, courses through the composition. Yet here, hints of cubism and Picasso-esque forms fracture and reassemble reality, bending space in unexpected ways. This surreal interplay reflects the inner life of a contemplative mind: pieces of memory, experience, and feeling rearranged until something new emerges.
In The Art of Contemplation, time doesn’t march. It floats. It pauses. It yawns. And in that gentle unraveling, we’re invited to slow down, to savour the hues of both past and present, and to sit for just a moment with the quiet complexity of being alive.
Buy The Art of Contemplation
With its vibrant palette, playful distortion of form, and layered symbolism, The Art of Contemplation is a statement piece suited to collectors of contemporary, pop-surreal, and modern figurative art. This original painting is for sale and would make a distinctive addition to a curated art collection or creative interior space.
Available now – enquire to purchase.
$790.00 NZD
Measuring 710mm x 560mm