Dear Art Lover,
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| Kitchen as Art Studio |
The last time I showed you a progress
image on my new bas-relief sculpture
project, “Wind and Wisteria,” was in
my post on 18 June, when I was still in a cast for a broken right wrist. I started the piece with my left hand. The cast was removed on 30 June, and I have
done a bit of work since then.
I asked my landlord and my neighbor to
lift the big board into my kitchen just before we got a few days of decent
[certainly better than nothing!] showers.
This is how far I had gotten with my non-dominant hand. I wanted the piece more vertical so that I
could start developing it.
Bas-relief is not “puffy painting” as I
once thought before meeting Eugene Daub
and Vasily Fedorouk. It is compressed form. That is a HUGE difference. What I mean by “puffy painting” is possibly similar to quilt making…where one defines the boundary of a shape and then puts
stuffing inside of it. It is a look, but
it is not bas-relief sculpture.
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| Side lighting from kitchen door |
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| Harsh top lighting, but you see the difference from above? |
So, I prefer to create a bas-relief
sculpture with an overhead light that helps me to see where the material is in
relation to other parts. However, this
green plastilina [an oil-based clay]
does not seem to have enough oil in it to stick well to the wood board, and I
woke one morning to see that the boy’s face and broken away from the
composition and slid down. Luckily it
was not damaged much. I have since
developed the form more anyway. [You may
see in the close-up shape here that I still have work to do. For example, the lips have to be
refined. There is too much harsh light
outlining the lips. I need to fill-in
some placed with clay, soften shapes, and think of the form of the mouth
barrel. I hope to make the mouth more
kind and youthful.]
Clay absorbs much more light than metal
does. If something looks contrasty in
the clay, it will be so much worse in reflective metal!
Lately, I have been creating the individual
petals of the wisteria. It is past time
for the real blooms on my gate, although I have a few random flowers that are confused by the
watering and drought. Trying to
understand them as models, but I am also using images as references. Mamma
mia, what a lot of work! I find myself
intimidated wondering if I can create the airiness of wind blowing in dangling
petals in a thin sculpture. When I feel
this way, I often force myself to work and accept that it will go slowly as I
figure out how to do what I think I want.
And another part of the day, I start a new project, because starting is
always fun, as one sees change and development move along quickly. I have learned that this is the only way I
can get through the hump of the tough times.
For the head of the wind, I am also
struggling. I am not sure that I am
capturing the idea that she is blowing, ie that SHE is creating the wind, or
she is the wind personified. And I chose
to make a composition that will be empty inside the shape, allowing the wall to
show through once hung. This means that
I have fewer things around her to show the effects of wind. Maybe not the smartest idea, compositionally
speaking? Piano, piano as they say too often in Italy, “slowly, slowly.”
Peace,
Kelly Borsheim, artist
P.S. Look at my cool phone case
that I ordered for myself as a gift for moving into the modern age of smart
phones. You may find your own desired
cover design, or other products here:
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| Il Dono - Borsheim Art on iPhone 5c case -choose yours |
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