Most cultures have developed some kind of attitude about rabbits. I’m guessing here, but I am going to assume, for example, Australians—especially sheep ranchers—do not nurture the association of cute and fluffy bunny with “wild rabbit.” I imagine their attitude includes dire thoughts about rabbits’ fecundity.
However, up north here in the Pacific Northwest, things are different. I started this composition on Easter Sunday. Early on in development I was musing on how I (and so many of us) can get so involved with my desires, wants, ambitions, concerns, loves, and ideas that I forget I’m living on a gorgeous planet and time is passing.
Seeing as how the Easter Bunny is one of the more whimsical features of Easter Sunday, a rabbit forced itself (really!) into the composition. Forget famous rabbits Bugs Bunny, Roger Rabbit and the darker sort. My bunny in “And Then A Rabbit Came By” is here to establish a metaphor: it is “real” looking and everything else is elemental art—pattern, color, form.
So the rabbit in this composition is here to say, “Hey! Yo! Earth to ______ [fill in name]!” in a quiet sort of way. It can remind one that there is more than oneself.
I often use pattern repeats to suggest the inexorable passage of time and what is always and forever. It is definitely used here with the background use of blue and gray stripes, red and yellow stripes, and even the golden yellow, gray and white diagonals. The diagonal patterns/stripes get more and more complicated as one approaches the rabbit figure. By that time, one’s preoccupation can be seen as small yet complex and overwhelming.
Of course one can engage in this art, or any, in whatever fashion suits at the time. This is simply how I got here. Oddly enough, it did turn out to be a rather adorable bunny after all.
“And Then A Rabbit Came By.” 2016. 20 x 16; acrylic paint, marker, gel and Micron pens. $700; shipped flat.
However, up north here in the Pacific Northwest, things are different. I started this composition on Easter Sunday. Early on in development I was musing on how I (and so many of us) can get so involved with my desires, wants, ambitions, concerns, loves, and ideas that I forget I’m living on a gorgeous planet and time is passing.
Seeing as how the Easter Bunny is one of the more whimsical features of Easter Sunday, a rabbit forced itself (really!) into the composition. Forget famous rabbits Bugs Bunny, Roger Rabbit and the darker sort. My bunny in “And Then A Rabbit Came By” is here to establish a metaphor: it is “real” looking and everything else is elemental art—pattern, color, form.
So the rabbit in this composition is here to say, “Hey! Yo! Earth to ______ [fill in name]!” in a quiet sort of way. It can remind one that there is more than oneself.
I often use pattern repeats to suggest the inexorable passage of time and what is always and forever. It is definitely used here with the background use of blue and gray stripes, red and yellow stripes, and even the golden yellow, gray and white diagonals. The diagonal patterns/stripes get more and more complicated as one approaches the rabbit figure. By that time, one’s preoccupation can be seen as small yet complex and overwhelming.
Of course one can engage in this art, or any, in whatever fashion suits at the time. This is simply how I got here. Oddly enough, it did turn out to be a rather adorable bunny after all.
“And Then A Rabbit Came By.” 2016. 20 x 16; acrylic paint, marker, gel and Micron pens. $700; shipped flat.
