I have almost finished the third painting in my series that I started 4 years ago for my show at Exeter Academy. I pulled the three panels out of the basement last week and saw how incomplete they were. I guess, having done a lot more with wax the past 4 years, I saw where I could take them now. Two weeks later I am much more satisfied with them. More of a story and more energy, more painterly. The third one is the wedding dress. About 10 years ago my friend Deborah was cleaning out her parents’ house when she found two old dresses from the early 1900’s and possibly from Italy as they were ex-patriots. The black one is mostly netting material and the wedding dress had the most amazing lace one could ever imagine which is another reason to believe it is from Italy. The mice had eaten the bottom of the dress which was satin causing the fabric to turn into long tendrils. I thought it so symbolic of the fleeting frailty of life. And wedding dresses are so symbolic of all the hopes, dreams and wishes of young women most of which are to fade away just like these dresses. When I was working on the dresses for the Exeter show, I was with Russell and we were deeply in the throes of a great love. I had the radio on and Madelaine Peyroux was singing Dance Me to the End of Love which Billy Holliday had also sung. I thought it the perfect title for the dress series.
The black dress and the orange spring dress are both finished. I am still tweaking the wedding dress.
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Your systematic process allowed progress to procede into an elegant statement. Thank you for sharing your method and feelings. Great works take time to complete.
Just magnificent Jess. All the pull
and angst of emotions resonate in that phrase, and it’s perfect for the dresses.. Can’t articulate just what that blog did to my heart, but the feeling is very powerful. Thank you. It’s a welcome feeling bringing up things oft not thought of.
xx
Hi Jessie,
I love these pieces…absolutely beautiful as I feel about all of your work. I am currently working on my personal website. It is called Consuelo Paint Studio and is in the early stages. Some of my work is on JPOS.com or JPAA.org two group web sites. However, the JPAA one is earlier work not my encaustic work. Will you be at the conference in P-town? I am going for a post conference on the 12th and 13th. I hope to meet up with you one day!
Happy Waxing~
Connie
Lovely paintings Jessie, and a lovely story. The series title is perfect.
It’s a great title for this series, Jessie. I happen to like Leonard Cohen’s version of the song. I also like what you wrote about these paintings. It’s really wonderful to be in the throes of love. The fact that it is fleeting in no way diminishes the wonder of the “pink cloud” . Maybe love is like painting. There is usually an early stage of joy and freedom that has to evolve (or devolve?) into the troubling passages before anything becomes close to resolving itself and calming down.
Whatever. I like what you’ve done with these dresses. They do seem all the richer for your attention, knowledge and skill.
Thank you one and all for your thoughtful comments. Many of them will help me with further progression on this series. One more yet to come. Have a great day, everyone!