Canvas to the Imagination

“Flowers have incredible power. Their fragile beauty ad brief life can teach us to enjoy without attachment, to experience deeply while knowing full well the experience is temporary. It is the same with all life. We will have pleasures and they too will be transitory. We are free when we are able to enjoy our pleasures without trying to hold on to them, when we are present without emotion-charged memories or looking forward to the next time. Life will have its joys and sorrows; to live fully we must live from the source, without attachment to either the pleasure of the pain.”
~ Open Mind by Diane Mariechild

I found the above quote a few weeks ago just as I was about to upload to flickr the dahlia portrait of Ariane. It seemed very appropriate given the subject matter of the shot and it also relates to some of my thoughts lately. I purchased the dahlias for the shoot from City Flowers Express at the Kitsilano Farmers Market earlier in the day. I chose dahlias specifically because both Ariane and I love them, and also they happen to have been in season at the time. Dahlias are amazing works of art in flower form, and they come in a wide range of colours and shapes.

This shot was inspired by the Spring is In the Air self portrait I did earlier in the year. I like how both shots are so happy and fun, and yet they each have a completely different feel. The photo below is a behind-the-scenes shot I took because it was amusing to have Ariane’s feet sticking out though the bunches of flowers.

I love this shot and it came about solely because Ariane put on her lovely green dress after I was finished photographing the main idea I had in mind for her shoot. (I’ll feature it in my next blog post.) I like it when things happen beyond what I had in mind and of course my ideas always evolve when I take them out of my head and make them a reality. I like how delicate this photo is. It was fun to experiment with moving the dress and shooting on a slower shutter speed combined with the flash.

The title of the photo, “Dancing on the Inside”, was suggested by Boris. It suits it very well.

I keep looking at this and feel it needs something more, but at the same time the right side of the book is filled with many objects and feels too busy. I’ll probably leave it alone in the end. The most interesting object in this composition is the jaw bones which are the remains of the young deer we consumed at Christmas last year. (More on that..) I found the bones while walking on Bowen with Anne over the Labour Day weekend and a mere month later have turned them into art. The little red feather is from a Scarlet Ibis at the Vancouver Aquarium that I picked up on a visit there more than a year ago. (Apparently I’ve been collecting random bits with a purpose!)

While I worked on this over the thanksgiving weekend I was reading The Gargoyle by Andrew Davidson which is an excellent book filled with layer upon layer of stories. I originally thought I would title this with a line from the book, but in the end my thoughts about it went elsewhere. Though maybe not so much since the past plays an important role in the plot of the book.

The materials used in this altered book: the jaw bones from a deer, small stones, beach glass, a brass button, half a mussel shell with barnacles, an ibis feather, dried berries, red thread, sewing pattern paper, a key, a ginko leaf, and a Japanese maple leaf.