Stretching Art and Tradition

Artist: Cynthia McNair, Arkona, Canada

I have always loved Mediaeval Art, so when this challenge came up, I was delighted. I was assigned the letter "U", not a great start, but thought that maybe I could do something with it, so started looking at mediaeval manuscripts and art for inspiration. As luck would have it, I fell across the Uncial script which was widely used at that period, I believe it was the script used for the Book of Kells, so my U is also in the Uncial script, I took the challenge very literally.

I was a ceramic conservator for some 20 years, so I have things in my studio that I have never used. When a piece of ceramic or china had been repaired, it then had to be painted to match the original and sometimes incorporated gold. It takes many many years to learn the art of gilding, and it was always a problem getting the golds to match. Gold leaf was always just too bright, so I have books of it in the studio which were never used, what better way to try and find a new use for it! The U is hand painted, beaded, (I don't use beads in my work either), and I also used bronze powders, the conservators favourite for gilding.

© 2014  Cynthia McNair