How Wings Work

I thought that something a bit more gentle might make a better start to the week.

this is gentle in execution and gentle in theme I think you will agree. Also when I took the photo the sun shone a ray across the picture and I liked it so i have left it in. I think it enhances the painting - it makes the central portion look slightly translucent, don't you think?

I had a bit of a struggle painting this all the same - but when don't I struggle - but in the end it came together very satisfactorily. With nice washes of colour to build up the flesh tones and then slightly stronger paint to make the wings.

This idea came to me one morning when I was lying in bed looking up at the ceiling and out the balcony door at the blue sky. i was half dozing and half dreaming I think and I jsut started thinking about how wings are held together. I seem to have some memory - it might be a bird wing actually - that some of the feathers are latched together by organic hook and eyes. So I decided to use this system for these metamoth wings too. I thought it was just one simple thought in a painting. Not too crowded like some of my others. Sometimes that simplicity is just very relaxing.

I like thinking about how things work; wings, crests on birds, lizard feet and those great long lizard tongues that shoot out to catch insects, insect feet on water, how seeds germinate and how they get from a to b, how fingers and toes bend and point and how chestnuts open and how they protect their seeds. The list is endless and as varied as the whole world. It gives me something to do in the early hours of the morning though.

Today being Monday I thought i would ease myself in to the week on moth wings.

Genesis

A very slow day. i seem to have accomplished almost nothing. I have not even made the bed!

I have had a walk and done my Spanish lesson for the day. So that is something. And I have made a big pot of soup to get me through the weekend without having to do too much cooking. I am only cooking for one this weekend as Vic is away until Tuesday.

I had planned to be very productive but for some reason i did not sleep very well and then got up to see Vic off on the 5.oo am Flybuss from the Fiskepiren. I came home as I felt it was a bit dark still for a walk and fiddled about a bit on the computer and then got absolutely starving so I made myself some breakfast. Then I did my first Spanish segment, but found my eyes were closing so at about 7.00 am i went back to bed and slept until 11.30!!!! I must have needed it. But obviously that took rather a large chunk out of my day and at this point I have not even put pencil to paper, or cutter to lino, or whatever.

Now I am just waiting for my soup to cook and am going to hang around for Bernardo - our Spanish Architect to ring at around 5.00. So when I finish writing this I will set up a work station for some lino cutting and even make a small start. With no one coming home to me for his tea I can work through the evening, or as long as I like. And I don't even have to make the bed, not even until Tuesday if i don't want to. You see how I depend on him really to keep me together! I prefer it when it is made myself.

This sculpture was an attempt to make something of a beautiful form. It is seed-like or pod-like, based in nature and growth and out of the top two little hands are growing and stretching upwards. It is not a complicated piece.

It is not a perfect piece though - I think it is too heavy for the size - the walls needed to be thinner. I liked the form and I liked the colour and I experimented with some silver leaf on it as well. I like playing around with surface decoration. Bronze is always thought of as a noble metal and most people think it should be left natural or given a traditional patination but I remember an artist I looked at while in college - his name escapes me now - he used to make female figures mainly, and quite erotic. They were cast in bronze and then he painted them! I imagine it was some sort of enamel paint or gloss, again the details are a bit hazy there. I think I need to do a little bit of research to remind myself of some of those details now. The point is, he just did what he wanted to get his result - not something to please somebody else.

Anyway - getting back to my own piece, I also experimented with the base of it, often an unconsidered afterthought. In this instance I wanted the base to be organic and in keeping with the actual sculpture I also wanted it to sort of disappear so that the sculpture would look like it was floating and the whole form could be seen, so this was one of my experimental resin castings - you remember, the ones which taught me an awful lot about the pitfalls and difficulties of this medium. this was the piece that I had to cast twice because the first one turned yellow as it overheated.

So, a good learning curve. But is it a good sculpture?