Another contribution from Kate Blalack from Oklahoma, USA. Your editor is very fortunate that she works for the magazine as a volunteer and does so in a very dedicated manner. Kate, a single mother, and her daughter Mina especially dressed up for this wonderful installment.
Mina and Kate
The descriptions are hers:
In this installment I have added some pieces that are quite whimsical. I am dealing in a very direct way with the archetype of the “fairy” – which in Theosophy we know to be representative of a certain type of elemental beings.
Pixie – Off to the Land of the Youth
(2’ tall x 6” wide, wire armature, polymer clay, natural fibers, acrylic paint)
When my daughter was 3 months old I had the opportunity to participate in a 3-day workshop with Wendy Froud, a prominent fantasy figurative-sculptor. She worked on movies such as Star Wars (she created Yoda) and The Labyrinth and The Dark Crystal (she was the conceptual designer for all of the puppets). While I had worked with polymer clay in the past, this workshop really helped me hone my skills. This pixie is what came out of the workshop. While he has an element of the surrealist “other-worldly” nature (important when “channeling” through visual art) he also is very much right out of a child’s fantasy, in terms of appearance. He is the fairy-archetype.
Wind Elemental or The Dryad
(2.5’ tall x 12 “wide, wire armature, paper clay, acrylic paint, natural fibers)
In Greek mythology the Dryad is really the spirit of a tree or forest. So, in Greek terms this was a “fairy.” This wind elemental/dryad captures the mood of the creatures of the wind, forest, birds, trees--flowing and weightless- spirit. Like the wind and forest, it is haunting and intense at times, a true guardian of the woods.
The Fairy
(watercolor on card stock, found butterfly wing)
In the Elizabethan and Victorian Eras fairies came back in a real way into popular culture. The ideas became grounded in youthful female figures with wings, dancing in the dew drops of flowers, and fluttering around. Here I have tried to capture that spirit in my own interpretation of their light-ness of being, joy and their ephemeral ( yet immortal) nature.