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After the Impact
C

After the Impact

8 1/2" x 6" Driftwood and Cherry. Gesso on driftwood and inside of fungi. Spore stalks are cherry with pyrography. Upper one has released it's spore. Bottom two are just emerging. Inspiration: This evolved from several things over a period of time. First I found the piece of driftwood while walking on the farm this Fall. When I picked it up it had several little critters in the crevices that thought they had found a dandy place to winter. I evicted them and took it home. Later on, I watched a program on TV about what would happen if an asteroid hit the earth. They said the only thing that would survive within hundreds of miles of impact would probably be some sort fungal spores. A few days later, I saw the driftwood on the bench, remembered the critters hiding in it, the TV show and the fungi and started fiddling. This is the result - mutated fungi sprouting from crevices in a charred remanent.
Thanks Mike and Ron.
Ron, a new direction? I don't know - maybe. I have some scrambled things running through my head right now that may or may not result in finished pieces if they ever sort themselves out!
 
Don't you need the ocean for drift wood? How did drift wood end up on a farm?

I really liked this piece at first glance when I thought it was flowers. Then I read your statment and found out it is supposed to be fungus. While I still appreciate the technical achievement, it doesn't hold the same emotional appeal for me now. I guess I'm not a fungus kind of guy in an end or times frame of mind at the moment.

Ed
 
Beautiful piece and fine photograph. How do you create the "heat wave" effect around the edges of the driftwood? Maybe it is just my old computer.
Richard in Wimberley
 
Ed, the farm is on the ocean side of the Eastern Shore of VA. We have driftwood on the marshes all the time. Sorry you don't like fungi...the whole idea was that life begins anew after disaster and fungi would be one of the first things to appear. Flowers will be much further along in time. :)
 
Richard,
Thanks. Mother Nature created the "heat waves" as you call them. They are actually where the softer grain of the wood was worn away by time and elements. Sort of like sandblasting.
 
Carole,

Very different. Somewhat of a challenge for me to consider. Yet, my eye was drawn to it. Like Ed, at first, I thought it was a flower. The fungi doesn't change my mind. The only question, is why would the fungi mutate? Could they remain unchanged?

John
 
Thank you John. Why did they mutate? Artistic license of course! Maybe the asteroid contained some strange chemical that we don't know even exists that caused the mutation. :) Does anything EVER remain unchanged throughout time?
 

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