Rising Angel

Rising Angel was done in charcoal pencil.  I love working with the idea of being suspended, or floating, between the ground and the sky.  I'm also into shading and creating multidimensional aspects.  I wanted the wings to look like they are made out of soft clouds, unlike realistic bird wings.  Similarly, the material of the dress is also cloud like; blurring the imagery between reality and fantasy.

This second drawing is the original version of Rising Angel.  I later modified it to have shorter wings and dress, as well as a vortex for the angel to ascend through, up to the night's sky.

(Second version)

Between Dark and Light Clouds

My last charcoal drawing is of a woman's image.  I got the idea for the title from a recent trip in the spring to Ireland.  It felt like depending on which cloud we were standing under, it would either be raining or sunny.  It was windy regardless, so this gave me the idea of being suspended between light and dark clouds.  Depending on what is going on in our lives, it directly affects our moods, just as light and dark clouds shift and flow above our heads.  We also shift and flow with the different kinds of clouds in our lives, or moods and different types of energy we experience.  The wind ties it all together; it is the energy which moves us from dark to light and back.  

And as the old Irish saying goes: 

"...May the wind be always at your back, May the sunshine warm upon your face"....

Between Dark and Light Clouds ~ Charcoal Pencils

Clefony

Music - inspired art

Clefony ~ charcoal pencils

  My drawings in charcoal pencils are my latest Creations.

  
 The two additional smaller drawings of Clefony, 
are a couple of the earlier stages of this piece.

 

Completed drawing

CLEFONY

The term Clefony is my made up word for a symphony of clefs.  It is an artistic-inspired word since bass and treble clefs intertwine in this abstract creation.  It is a word-play on the coupling of clef with symphony.  In Clefony, I fuse together non moving images such as the musical clefs, in contrast to moving elements, such as the small music notation.  The treble clef endings resemble bows of the string family, adding a more angular contrast to the roundness of the clefs, as if playing them like they were instruments.  The angled treble clef closest to the top spirals downward, glistening in imitation to the brass wiring of a french horn.  The hook of the top bass clef rounds-off into a pear's seed, hinting at the notion that music and art appeal to many of our senses, causing us to feel more alive.

Geisha Playing a Shamisen

Souvenir masks from Japan

A gate to a shrine in Japan shot from underneath 
to feature the ornamented decor.

The inspiration for this drawing came from my trip with my husband Alex to Japan, in the winter of 2011, where we saw several geisha in a busy street in Kyoto.  A tourist crowd formed around them as if they were celebrities, and cameras went clicking away.  Being affected by the book: Memoirs of a Geisha, I had so many images of Gion (the most exclusive and well known geisha district in Japan) already in my mind.  I couldn't wait to see the old city streets, buildings, and shrines.  Having just gone to the Tokyo museum, and learning so much about Japan's history and the relationship of the old capital of Kyoto to the new capital of Tokyo, I was eagerly awaiting the train trip to Kyoto.  I was taken back by the history and culture of Japan's old capital, and wished we could have stayed there longer then a weekend.  I bought a souvenir doll and drew it, to take something even more personal away from that unforgettable adventure.  Bellow, are some photographs from our trip, which inspired me to create this drawing, followed by the evolution of the stages of the drawing. 

Geisha Playing a Shamisen ~ charcoal pencils

The 4 photos bellow were taken in Kyoto, Japan.  

We did a walking tour of the city, and it was one of the highlights of our trip.

 

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I took these 2 sculpture photos bellow 

at the lobby of a restaurant at the top of the Tokyo Museum, 

where we overlooked the city on a cloudy day.

 

Four wooden fortunes sold outside the Meiji Jingu, a Shinto shrine in Tokyo. Shinto: The indigenous religion of Japan, devoted to deities of natural forces and glorifying of the emperor as a descendant  of the sun goddess.

Evolution of Geisha Playing a Shamisen:

 Doll used as a model for my drawing.

Stage 1

Stage 2

 Completed drawing

At a recent visit to the Montgomery Museum of Fine Art, I revisited a kimono display made of cast glass, entitled Ojigi, by American artist, Karen LaMonte.  I revisit this display with each return to the museum.  Time after time, it captivates me, drawing me to its mystical presence.  The ethereal way in which the glass captures the light, causes me to sense both past and future.  Because the figure was made of glass, and not marble or brass, it possesses the ability to capture light, causing a timeless appeal.  Coming back to this display has given me a recapitulation, a return, with a new perspective, and a closure to my whole Japanese travel experience, and charcoal drawing of Geisha Playing a Shamisen.

The Rose

In The Rose, leaves blowing in the wind from diagonal directions intersect and merge to form the image of a rose, which is suspended at an angle.  The Rose is a fusion of the soft smudged leaves on the interior of the flower, which interlace with the more ornate sharper edged intersecting leaves.  It is a play on the two textures.  The flower head itself acts as a magnetic force that pulls the sharper edged ornate leaves into it's center, causing the panoramic view to seem multidimensional.  In this piece, I play with the idea of the still life image of the flower being juxtaposed with the crossing of the leaves and the illusion of motion contrasting it's windless leafy bulb.

The Rose ~ charcoal pencils

Evolution of The Rose:
 

The Rose ~ stage 1

The Rose ~ stage 2

The Rose ~ stage 3

The Rose ~ stage 4