“Images
of the flowers world”
Water-colors
inspired to the Japanese technique sumi-è
« To paint
flowers, is imitate what nature has of most pleasent and most
fascinating ; flowers seems in fact created for seducing the
eyes, and it's to the painter, in particular to the water-colorist,
to pay a tribute to their beauty ».
Henry Guédy, Nuovo
manuale completo di pittura ad acquarello, 1903.
These water-colors that have
essentially a decorative vocation, were born from the artist's
interest for Asian art, and more particularly for the technique
of the Japanese « zen » painting, said
Sumi-e.The technique as
well as the thematic have this source of common inspiration
in her work.
Japanese art has influenced French painters since the end
of the XIX century : not only the impressionists (the renowned
Ninfees of Monet
or the series of almond tree in
flower of Van Gogh)
but also Nabis's painters.
Realized with a process inspired to Sumi-e
painting, these water-colors are centered on the floral world
and what is connected to it (insects, fishes...). We can find
some recurrent subjects of the universe of Asian engravings
ukiyoe ("The fluctuating
world") : giant peonies (China's flower), flowers of
lotus, orchids, dragonflies in flight and red carps.
 To
these subjects, other inspiring images more frequent in the
botanical imagery (like poppies, dandelions, iris and butterflies),
or in the italian cinquecento still lives (1), are added.
In the series of monochrome water-colors, the views in first
plan also refers to the modern and geometric compositions
of Carl Blossfeldt's botanical
photos.
In general, the shots exalt the asymmetry and marry oblong
sizes typical of the Asian culture, using the white spaces
as full forms. Finally, as in the “zen” painting,
the realization is gestural. Every form is created by a gesture
studied on purpose. The search is that of the essentialness,
of the simplicity and of the naturalness directed to reveal
the essence of the things.
A formal simplicity that we can, in such sense, unite to the
condensed language of the “haiku's”
poems.
A search illustrated in the words of an ancient "zen"
painter that was asked how much time he had employed for painting
the image of a bamboo. He answered : "fifty
years to study it, five minutes to paint it”.
Jeanne Isabelle
Cornière
Notes
(1) - Particularly Giovanna Garzoni's
tempera still lives full of butterflies and insects.
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