CYANOTYPE SILK SCROLLS: TOI & MOI
Toi & Moi is a story about the poetry of being, the miracle of love, the fleeting beauty of shared moments. Martin Heidegger once said that poetically man dwells. There is mystery and magic in the simplest things. A walk along the river, a shared meal, an evening light that falls upon the face you’ve known for ears… these are the treasures that make the life worth living. Nothing grand… I hold your hand… I feel your heart is beating and it’s enough…
Cyanotype silk scrolls with cyanotype haiku poems on handmade Japanese paper, my artist signature seal, archival ink, tree branch. ~ 155 x 55 centimeters.
A haiku poem comes to me as a little epiphany. I take a walk in Bois de Boulogne. I gather flowers and leaves and put them in a special press to dry for a couple of weeks. When the plants are ready I start working on the scroll. I think about the poem and its connection to the print I want to see on the scroll. The choice of plants and the shape of the areas I am going to cover with light sensitive cyanotype emulsion are intuitive. After exposure the design is embedded into the fibers of the silk. The silk is gently washed in running water to reveal the the gorgeous blue that symbolizes hope. I take a piece of handmade paper and tear it to the shape that would fit in the center of the scroll. I brush cyanotype emulsion on the paper and let it dry. The poem is written in black acrylic paint on a transparency. After exposure to UV light the poem too becomes a photograph. I hand stitch the silk to create an opening that would fit the branch that suspends the scroll.
I was often asked how do you envision the display of your work. I do not believe these scrolls should be framed or otherwise separated from the viewer. They are alive, they breathe, they move. They are like you. You wouldn’t want to be a glass cage. Would you? They are going to age and aquire imperfections from the process of aging in your presence. It is ok. It is part of their beauty and the philosophy of the aesthetics of wabi-sabi that brought them into being in the first place. You wouldn’t stop loving your partner because of a couple of wrinkles. They are endearing. It is the same with these scrolls.
