Much of my current work is about life’s journeys: how we arrive where we are and what happens on the way, shaping us as people and providing us with frameworks to deal with new adventures. I have looked at this theme metaphorically, through the classical myth of Persephone and more literally, through landscapes and the cycles of the moon (Fields of Gold).
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Persephone
Do you know the ancient Greek myth of Persephone? (Or Proserpine, if you are a Latin scholar.)
Persephone is the beautiful daughter of Demeter (Ceres) the goddess of nature and harvest. She is kidnapped and dragged down to the underworld by Hades, where she pines away while her mum rages across the face of the earth, searching for her. Demeter is so totally preoccupied with her search and her grief that she neglects nature: the crops fail and the earth slowly dies. Eventually Helios the sun god, who had witnessed the kidnapping, is alarmed and tells Demeter where Persephone is. Demeter confronts Hades and he agrees to release Persephone so long as she has eaten nothing in the underworld. Except that he had been tempting her with huge banquets and she had tasted six tiny, tantalising pomegranate seeds.
Demeter appeals to the gods and they decree that Persephone can return to the earth but that her penance will be six months incarceration in the underworld every year: one month for each pomegranate seed. Demeter’s sorrow at her daughter’s annual departure and joy at her return are the supposed origins of our seasons.
The story has always puzzled me.
What if Persephone had eaten the whole pomegranate - hundreds and hundreds of seeds? Would that have brought on the next Ice Age? What if she had been tempted instead by other fruit – shining sensual, sensational cherries – or perfectly ripe purple plums – or glistening, sticky fulsome figs? Was she condemned in any case – or could she have changed her destiny by making other choices?
Materials and processes
This series of work is based on carefully-observed pen drawings of fruit bowls, coloured with water-soluble crayons or pastels. I trace off my drawings and machine the designs onto calico, adding monochrome acrylic paint and a portion of a colour laserprint of the original drawing.
The main black-and-white design represents the underworld, but I have a sneaking suspicion that Persephone may not have been kidnapped by Hades, but actually ran away with him, so the blackness is softened with inviting satin and velvet, and shadowy fruits in the margins.
I form the ‘shaft of light’ with the colour laser print and pieced fabrics, stitched down with seeding. Within this shaft are Persephone’s tempting fruits: tantalising pomegranate seeds, sensual cherries or slices of glistening figs. These are raised, like stumpwork or goldwork, using layers of felt as stuffing, overlaid with shiny fabrics and embellished with and stitching and beads. This is opportunity.
I had been going through a pretty rough time when I started this series, living in the ‘underworld’ of a life I no longer wanted. I finally found the courage to do something about my situation and felt the imperative to seize opportunities as they arose. I didn’t always know what the outcomes would be, but was sure that I should no longer allow them to pass me by.
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