I was intrigued by a small black and white photo of what is probably New York City's Central Park (or could it be Chicago?). The contrast between the tranquil park and the looming skyscrapers particularly interested me. I didn't want to put people in the scene, and it was too empty otherwise, so I added two garbage cans (complete with beads for soda pop cans and a little piece of crumpled paper) and some dandelions. The foreground tree was a breakthrough in style for me. I love to stitch trees using "thread painting". The pond fabric is hand-marbled, and stitched with rayon thread of different shades of blue. Shadows were added beneath the trees with a black Pigma fabric pen.
As I worked and thought about the elements in the scene, this wallhanging grew to become a statement of our impact on nature. There is no "circle of life" -- we have squared off the circle and fragmented it. We've put garbage where beauty was. Another irony - this piece is not square; the center scene is slightly wider than it is tall.
The border is woven of one-inch fabric strips. Slivers of fabric were scattered across the squares to break up the monotony. Each side of the border represents one of the ancient elements: water, fire, air, earth. The ends are left hanging: is it unfinished, or unraveling?
Detail
