BY KAREN BOSSICK

Sarah Bird is a realist oil painter who uses 19th century techniques and 17th century Flemish perspectives to weave still life and landscape together.

Some of her oil paintings resemble typical still lives—say, wilted roses atop a rotting gourd that she’s arranged on cloth. Others take on something more akin to the look of a landscape with leaves set against a dark background.

Every once in a while, she’ll insert something playful, such as pigs, chickadees, raccoons and pandas inspired by the stickers that her children ages 6 and 4 covet.

Twenty-five of Bird’s works are currently on display at Hemmings Gallery, 340 Walnut Ave. in Ketchum, in a solo show called “Tiny Fruits.” And Bird will be present during the Gallery Walk reception from 5 to 7:30 p.m. Friday, Dec. 29, along with Sally Metcalf and Wes Walworth, whose basket weavings and sculptures are also being displayed.

“Sarah is so impressive on many levels,” said Glin Varco, co-owner of Hemmings Gallery. “Technically, her paintings are really well executed and her subject matter is something a lot of people can relate to. Yet, her paintings are unique. There’s a surreal aspect that makes you want to get up close and spend a lot of time examining her paintings.”

Bird hails from Concord, Mass., where as a child she sat next to her mother watching her paint shells and rocks in acrylic. She developed an early love for art and the Hudson River School painters who celebrated the outdoors by depicting landscapes in oils.

She studied public policy at Brown University in Providence, R.I. But, as soon as she graduated, she knew that she was meant to be a painter. And, so, she headed to the Grand Central Atelier Academy of Art in New York City where she spent four years studying with contemporary realist painters like Jacob Collins.

There she developed an affinity for still life.

“I love looking at the proportions of things as compared with other things. And I like the control that I have in painting still lives versus landscapes. I like having the freedom to put things in a painting, sort of like puzzle pieces,” said Bird, who received a 2017 Idaho Arts Grant.

Bird paints with a very small size zero brush—its tip the size of a pencil point. That makes her process similar to traditional egg tempura painting or needlework. She uses it to paint backdrops that you would think would take weeks to paint they’re so detailed. But she says the objects in her paintings take longer by the time she’s pondered them.

Bird moved to the Wood River Valley eight years ago with her husband Nick Neely, whose book “Alta California” describes his 650-mile walk following that taken by Capt. Gaspar de Portola from San Diego to San Francisco in 1769.

Here, she works in a rustic 1920s wood outbuilding behind her home, which sits a stone’s throw from Hop Porter Park in Hailey. She’s hung farm tools and other found objects on the outside of the building and inside she keeps seed pods and other items that eventually find their way onto her paintings.

Historically, still life paintings honored material wealth as they featured exotic fare, China and crystals. But Bird has chosen to depict the natural, including trailside weeds and wilting roses, along with thrift store objects.

Every once in a while, she deviates from traditional still lives to offer viewers a surprise. One of the paintings in her current show, for instance, resembles an advent calendar with its doors opening in various angles out onto an Idaho landscape.

Another painting boasts the orange, yellow and pink hues of wrapping paper.

“I like wrapping paper, and I wanted to depict the transparency of it,” she said.