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• 1983: Dimensional Work - Oberon and the Butterfly, Vignette from The Carnival Collection - Private Collection

1983: Dimensional Work - Oberon and the Butterfly, Vignette from The Carnival Collection - Private Collection

This is the first in The Carnival Collection, a series of dimensional figures I fabricated not long after I received a Master of Visual Arts in Illustration. During my last few classes when my illustrative style clarified, I was inspired to begin dimensional work. This grouping of suspended figures in plexiglas boxes for wall mount installation has been easily one of the most difficult collections I have ever attempted.  Suspension with invisible thread through minute holes in clear plexiglas hangers within a transparent plexiglas box requires good fine muscle control and mental patience.  

Oberon is fabricated differently than any other dimensional work I have completed.  I utilized antique fabric and lace in conjunction with handmade paper. The face, not as developed as many to follow, has great sensitivity, emotionally connecting to the butterfly just beyond his reach.  I often favor my prototypical work as I certainly do in this case. I think there is an authenticity and an appealing vulnerability to the first of a collection that never shows up in the subsequent work. 

When one considers the metaphor of the fairytale, I believe that dimensional figurative work can be as inherent in story magic as flat illustration. What was, in the beginning, an unconscious decision on my part to fabricate dimensionally, has become as integral a piece to my spinning of tales as illustration.