Flutterbye

“I just adore the way you put faeries into all your work. That’s what makes it soooo special,” she gushed, “I luuuuuuuv faeries.”

She was looking at “I Dreamt the Jacobean Rose,” (left) one of several samples I’m pulling together for a prospective client and, frankly, it ain’t of a faery. Especially NOT a fashionably flirty flower faery. (say that fast five times)

Now, I don’t want to stomp on anybody’s religion and I’m not making fun of people who luuuuuv faeries.

(OK, well, maybe I am…)

But see, I have a sneaking suspicion that if there really are non-insectivorous winged beings hanging around peoples’ gardens, they absolutely SPIT on cute and fluffy.

Less giggly nectar-sipping and a whole lot more POUNCE-CHEW-GULP.

Hmmmm. Some day I might sculpt my version of real faeries. It won’t be pretty.

Ever since I figured out I could sculpt faces (and, more important, get the expressions right), I’ve had this obsession with hiding faces in my sculptures, to the point that there’s always at least one face (or body part) in anything I do.

It’s kind of my own personal “Where’s Waldo?” game, and it’s not particularly benevolent. It’s both an admission that some hidden soul knows a lot more about these worlds than I…and foreboding that some day I’m liable to slip into one of these places and never find my way back.

As I said, not particularly benevolent.

Right then, the smart thing would have been to smile happily at my faery-luvving buyer and congratulate her for her amazing insights. Or maybe tell her I admire the way she can incorporate someone else’s art into her own personal fantasies.

My friend Catharine said as much last week: “If people can put themselves into your art, it’s good art. You should be happy.”

OK, I am. As I’ve said, it’s fascinating, listening to viewers interpret my sculpture.

I’ve had near-novels recited over May and Boy, Bubbles and the Vintner which have absolutely nothing to do with what those sculptures really portrayed. Some of the stories I’ve been told are so good I’m tempted to adopt them instead of the real thing.

OTOH, I now call the blue sculpture above, “the labia piece” ever since a famous sculptor firmly insisted that’s what it depicted.

“Tell me, Cynthia,” he said admiringly, “Is this a birth or an exodus? Is the woman emerging from the labia…or returning?”

“Uhm…it’s a tulip,” I said, dumbfounded, while the gallery owner frantically gestured for me to shut up.

My oh-so-supportive friends shrugged, “Well, of course that’s what it is–we thought it was pretty obvious.”

And if you don’t think THAT made me delve into the depths of my soul for hidden sexual tensions coming out in my work, think again.

Score minus-one for self-awareness, I suppose.

But….faeries? “That is NOT a faery,” I say through gritted teeth, “It’s just a tiny woman’s face embedded in a flower…OK, I can see where that might be interpreted as a faery, but…

Then I had an inspiration. “Here,” I said, dragging her over to May (left), “See? I don’t always put faeries in my work.”

She took a good long look at May, the menacing face, the angry expression, the stark black glass that surrounded her.

“Oh,” she said, “An EVIL faery!”

Sigh.