Tuesday, March 24, 2015

My Entry for EBSQ's February 'What a Doll' Show: 'Beryl Moon'






Meet 

"Beryl Moon"



"Beryl Moon", a sculpted Art Doll created from re-purposed objects



Last month, EBSQ, the online art community I've long been a member of, hosted their monthly art exhibit, with the theme for February being, "What a Doll".  This was my entry: "Beryl Moon", an Art Doll sculpted using paper mache plus a whole host of all-recycled materials 



"The Moon Was But a Chin of Gold", by Emily Dickinson




I painted and finished her as inspired by the following poem, by Emily Dickinson:


The Moon was but a Chin of Gold
A Night or two ago—
And now she turns Her perfect Face
Upon the World below—

Her Forehead is of Amplest Blonde—
Her Cheek—a Beryl hewn—
Her Eye unto the Summer Dew
The likest I have known—

Her Lips of Amber never part—
But what must be the smile
Upon Her Friend she could confer
Were such Her Silver Will—

And what a privilege to be
But the remotest Star—
For Certainty She take Her Way
Beside Your Palace Door—

Her Bonnet is the Firmament—
The Universe—Her Shoe—
The Stars—the Trinkets at Her Belt—
Her Dimities—of Blue—




"Beryl Moon", a view from behind



She was actually a long time coming, my "Beryl Moon", because I initially began her many moons (ha-ha) ago, only to set her aside for some reason (ADHD mostly, I suppose), abandoned and unfinished.   Started as part of a project to rescue the dead, mangled barbies left behind after my daughter's childhood, it was my intention to breath new life into these hopelessly broken objects so as to keep them out of the waste stream, where they were surely destined.  And I did get a reasonably good and interesting start on a few of them, before I became distracted by something else and rudely shoved them all onto the back-burner (story of my life?)....


An in-progress project I call the "Dead Barbies Society" -- its mission being to turn useless broken junk into Art, people!  ART...!



However, this one in particular was the furthest along....: 





....thus she was the one I grabbed when I decided I needed something to enter into the EBSQ "Doll" show last month...:








And so I got her finished, finally....! 
The following is cut and pasted from my artist/entry statement (because I'm lazy like that):


Buried deep inside 'Beryl Moon', under Celluclay (a commercial paper clay product) and layers of paper mache, is a wee 'injured' action figure, but a few inches tall, and missing an arm. Spared from a landfill life, he now provides some inner armature for this Art Doll, though little of him is actually recognizable anymore, given that an entirely new being was sculpted over and around his original form, using re-purposed items (including but not limited to: a plastic cup, multiple plastic cup lids, and newspaper), for a complete and thorough transformation. A whole new, crescent-moon shaped head was sculpted from Celluclay and attached (the head of the original figure/doll ends somewhere deep within in the present neck/chest area), along with a newly sculpted arm, and new hands. In addition to gaining inches in height (now standing about a foot tall), "he' also became a 'she', complete with a newly sculpted bosom, as well as a big, bustled and flowing skirt of Stars -- using as my inspiration the poem, "The Moon Was But a Chin of Gold", by the wonderful and talented poet, Emily Dickinson....: 




"....now she turns Her perfect Face
Upon the World below—...."



And so there you have it, my "What a Doll" show entry.  
Which..., I'm happy to be able to report tied for "Member's Mention" (2nd Place) in the show...!  Thanks so much, EBSQ...!







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