Mermaid Series
This work started when
I reached my limit trying to capture the spirit of a place with my traditional tools. I am talking about an eighteenth century house on top of a cliff above the ocean and under the sky in Maine, where my small family and I are sometimes lucky enough to spend a week during summer. On our last visit, I had my watercolour and pencils as usual, but this time, I also had something new in my toolbox: I was finally going to experiment with cyanotype.
Cyanotype is a photographic printing process that uses sunlight to print shadows. I felt the warmth of this idea slowly spreading in my chest – capturing shadows was the perfect thing to do in a place I am always complaining about precisely not being able to capture.
So there we are, day one on the island: creaking wood floors, amazing light, generous fireplace. Strange tools from a different era all over. Massive rusted chains share the house in perfect harmony with gold trimmed porcelain cups. Kerosene lamps and candles are the only source of light at night besides the moon herself. (I know, some visitors use practical headlamps, but we don’t like those).
Day in and day out, I am away from electricity and noise, not in “close contact with”, but immersed in raw nature, in such golden light and silence, surrounded by the deep breathing of the tides, all in and all out every 12 hours. As I stand up there on the top of that rock, first thing in the morning and last thing before sleep, my latitude and longitude pinned to my heart, the spirit I was trying to capture begins to grow like life itself, past the house walls and way past what the eye can see. I am in the center of a radar that keeps expanding 360 degrees, spotting whales, seals and mermaids, as well as sea birds and celestial bodies.
Those of us who love being in the wild do so because it reminds us of who we truly are. Over those days I found my seal skin and returned to the ocean. This work is my journey's diary.
Information about all pieces above:
Technique: Cyanotype, gold leaf, black ink and white pastel.
Size: 12 in x 8 in (30 cm x 20 cm)
Price: u$ 420.00 (frame included)
a mermaid's prayer
May the vastness that entered my heart never leave.
May the horizon that reshaped my dreams remain, imprinted in my eyes, a level in my chest.
May the stars in the colander sky vigil my sleep.
May the seabird take the sky: her wings, my kite.
May the roof of clouds above my head continue to pass by and transform in the hands of wind.
May the tides keep breathing, in and out, calmly.
May the ocean never leave my soul again.