Beauty and the Pests

                 Beauty and the Pests

The artist, yours truly, checking on the display of 'Beauty and the Pests' at the Tubac Art Center.  This was a special show focused on a local authors publication, "A Beautiful and  Cruel Country".  The author had lived in the area in the early days and describes the beauty of the unspoiled land.  On the other hand it was a tough life with an  unforgiving climate and limited basic necessities for subsistence. Artists that wished to enter a piece in the exhibition were instructed to read the book and tie their art to some feature of the story.  It was an interesting challenge, more-so than fitting your work to a broad, general topic.  My vessel was of good size using segments of cottonwood and a solid cottonwood piece at the top opening.  Cottonwood comes in a wide variety of types but all belong to the Willow Family.  The Fremont cottonwood is the type found in this part of Arizona.

As a kid growing up in Montana and attending a small country school, I have fond memories of the huge cottonwoods that circled the school yard.  They were wonderful climbing trees and their seed berries were just right to wage war on other students.  When they matured and split open a cotton substance was spilled into the air.  Seeds were attached to this cotton sail and they flew far and wide to plant new trees.

I decided I would do a contrast between the plants and bugs found in this area, presented as specimens like we did as kids.  The challenge was to incorporate them on or in my vessel.  For example a butterfly would be a beautiful thing as apposed to a scorpion.  A flower was beautiful but a bur would be considered a pest.  I collected a quantity of this type material and cast each piece in separate clear resin blocks.  Each was numbered and assigned a spot on the surface of the vessel.  Next, cottonwood segments were attached to the vessel surface leaving the spot for each resin covered specimen open.  When all wood segments were attached and grouted together this left numbered pockets where the specimens were mounted and covered with more clear resin.  The total surface was sanded smooth and finished with oil and wax.  A close-up view of the finished piece is shown below.  The inside surface of the vessel was covered with sharp thorn material.

More detail can be found on my art at my website <www.apatchablue.com>