Angela Valamanesh
Once I was a teardrop 2023
Acrylic on paper on wooden board and ceramic
Artist statement:
Once I was a teardrop unites the two mediums that I focus on in my practice, drawing/painting, and ceramic. The title refers to the notion that everything is made up of incredibly minute particles that circulate indefinitely, that we are infinitely connected to all matter in the Universe.
Over the past forty years I have always drawn, occasionally exhibited finished works and at one stage made works that included framed works on paper with several separate ceramic objects to form one work. Recently I united the two materials into one work by fixing small ceramic elements on to the surface of a painting or drawing.
With Once I was a teardrop, I wanted to use the surface of white paper for its absorbent qualities that give a kind of watercolour transparent effect. I didn’t want to cover the ceramic elements with glass when framed so to avoid framing I used the heaviest sturdiest paper I could find and mounted the paper onto wooden boards. This leaves a small gap between the wall and the paper. I left a torn edge of paper overlapping the boards to reflect the uneven edge of the floral motif and to have another hand-made element. The panels are lightweight and the strong paper edges are protected during transport by being sensitively packed. Repetition allowed for each flower and each black teardrop to be slightly different.
The representation of flowers in design and art is vast: Georgia O’Keeffe, Andy Warhol, William Morris not to mention all the amazing botanical illustrators that have inspired me over the years. Flowers can represent a multitude of emotions and feelings: from love, passion and desire to purity, innocence or even death. Some believe that it represents the unity of all life and the interconnectedness of all beings, a symbol of the cycle of life, death, and rebirth or symbolic of the union of the sacred masculine and the divine feminine.
The pink flesh /dried blood colour of the flower motif in Once I was a teardrop could be seen as feminine. Personally, I think it is natural to be attracted to flowers, a bit like a pollinating insect.