Tri-dimensional use of Hare Skin, Quail Feathers, Javelina and Deer Bones to Tell Myths and Stories

I wanted to experiment with a mélange of materials framed within a defined space. So I had a frame and decided to build another one similar to it with wood and plywood I had. A can of textured paint and I was ready for my experiment.

I had quail wings and feathers so of course Icarus came to mind. But I did not want to fly too high on my first try, so mixed the themes of bones, turquoise stone, feather and hare skin to paint a phantasmagoric scene.

The framed work looks like this:

And the detail shows two creatures, in a happy:

and sexual mood:

I called this work “Feathers and libido”.

The second is inspired by the palm reader, future-teller Kurdish women who walked the city streets with a child in their arms. As a young boy I was fascinated by these women who usually had goat or sheep knuckle bones in a bag and will throw them in the air to see how fate will arrange their landing position. Then they will interpret what it all means for the customer’s wealth, love life and longevity.

Here is the overall look of the work:

The detail about the future-teller woman is this. Her hand has mysterious tattooed signs, and I showed only one eye looking through the fingers:

Upon the woman's head is a mystical bird, perhaps a crow. But to blurr all resemblance, I made its beak out of a buffalo tooth. The roots of the incisive make for an unusual beak...

Finally, I added the lower jaw of a Javelina (Peccary) to the frame to bring in the theme of bones in reading the future. I painted the mythical Kokopelli flute player on both sides of the jawbone.  And in the upper right corner of the frame I placed  also a genuine Native American stone arrowhead to emphasize that, as my father used to say “man has no shield against death’s arrow.”

I called this work “Fatima Tells the Future.”

Now these two pieces are on my wall and I think I will explore further how different materials can coexist within the confines of a frame and tell a story borrowing from the very nature of the organic materials I will use.

August 7, 2018

© Vahé A. Kazandjian, 2018