Crystal Method

This piece was created for the UNDISCLOSED exhibit at the Toledo School for the Arts. The exhibit is a fundraiser for the school in which patrons purchase tickets, then randomly draw a number from a fishbowl at the event that determines the order in which they can choose a piece. The artists sign their works on the back of the piece; hence the “undisclosed” part, which puts all of the artists on a level playing field in the selection process.

I did this one in a style that’s different from my signature black-and-white, gravity-agnostic, news-driven pieces for the purpose of obfuscating who did it, and I think I was successful. The blend of gouache at the bottom was a last-minute addition at the suggestion of my daughter, and I’m pleased with how that came out; it creates depth where there wasn’t before. The top was surprisingly demanding to create with precision (freehand is hard!), and the entire piece took a good eighteen hours or so. The foremost row of crystals are outlined with Gelly Roll’s Metallic pens and filled with their Glaze pens, which gives them a three-dimensional aspect and makes them glisten as the viewer shifts their perspective. Those in the middle are filled with the Moonlight pens, and the rear-most were done with the Derwent Inktense pencils, the marks of which were then ‘washed’ with a wet brush. The purpose of using the different types of pens and pencils was also to create a sense of depth in the crystal array, but I can’t decide how effective that was – What do you think?