Roseworks
These works were inspired by the act of preserving rose petals. In a way, I have cheated nature and intervened with the fate of these rose petals. Instead of allowing nature to decay these rose petals away, I have preserved them; I have given them new life and new purpose. I have turned something that is meant to die into something that will live forever.
As so much as this work is about the materials, it has become even more about the process. For hours I will sit with my bottle of water based sealant and my paint brush completely coating the freshly plucked rose petals and then setting them out to dry. As days pass with their new glossy coat, the petals retain their lively shape, having only deepened in color. White quickly turns to gold, pink to lavender, and red to a deep maroon.
I was really drawn to these materials because of the basic art elements of texture, form, space, shape, line, color and value, and the beauty that can be created when combining all of the elements of art into one or multiple works. I believe that both the colors and the systematic overlapping of these lustrous rose petals create a rich texture and drama. These works are organized into patterns of color gradation, repetitive tiling, and symmetry, all of which are design elements and orders commonly found in nature that I believe to be universally readable and understandable.
-Leslie LaChance