FROM ANTON KRAJNC'S "WORKS ON PAPER":
"SELVA OSCURA - THE HUNTRESS AND THE MUSE"
"Nel mezzo del cammin' di nostra vita
mi ritrovai per una selva oscura,
che la diritta via era smarrita..."
("In the middle of the path of our life
I found myself in a dark forest,
having lost the way...")
DANTE ALIGHIERI
(Opening line of the "Divina Commedia")
The forest in this painting is a metaphor for life.
As we walk through it, we find ourselves again and again
in a dark and tangled thicket... looking for a way out.
The artist sees the daily problems and questions that confront
him,
that threaten his creativity, as trees, blocking the way.
He takes care of them by cutting them down, one after the other.
In doing so, he changes their grey to many colors:
a challenge has been met, an experience lived.
The elegantly mysterious birch trees with their silvery-white bark,
growing along the path chosen by the artist,
have a special mythological past: they are the trees of light.
Consecrated to the moon, but also to the sun, whose rebirth they signal
as the trees of the first month in the Solar Year (Dec. 24 - Jan. 21).
The leaves in the painting belong to other trees - maple and oak -
that have been left behind by artist and onlooker.
Diana, Goddess of the Hunt,
half hidden under the bark of a Sycamore tree,
turns to the viewer, looks directly at him/her.
A beautiful, alluring allusion to the various aspects
of the "hunt", which we encounter in our lives.
Bow and arrow as decorative accessories of love... and death.
One arrow has found its mark (?) in a tree behind Diana.
The second female figure is the Muse,
watching over the artist, accompanying him in many disguises,
always present on his path.
She nourishes and protects him and she inspires him.
She symbolizes the strength of his backbone and spiritual love -
and she keeps in balance the passion waiting under the bark of the Sycamore tree.
The cutting is not a killing,
but rather a pruning back to the essential,
to the living heart of the tree,
ready to let new life,
new ideas grow from its core.
A thinning of the forest.
A clearing.
An illumination.
Krajnc does not separate work and life.
The palette among the colorful tree-trunks,
supporting them/lying partly hidden beneath them,
betrays his presence. A new tree is growing from a stump.
(Krajnc' black bird is sitting on the highest branch.)
An egg lies in its green nest: rebirth.
The circle of life unbroken.
"SELVA OSCURA - THE HUNTRESS AND THE MUSE":
107cm x 81cm
egg tempera, watercolor, pen and ink and gold leaf on Arches paper
(one of five works in a series on the theme of THE DARK FOREST.)
PORTFOLIO
last modified: April 9, 2012
images and layout: ANTON,
page prepared and text by: DAGMAR
akstudio@flash.net
Copyright© 1997-2012 by Anton Krajnc. In keeping with the spirit of the Internet, all images are
for personal, non-commercial use only. Photography by Anton Krajnc and Dagmar.
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