Guest Post, Mary Shindell: Inflection Point ll

My working process is influenced by my experience and interaction with the world around me.

In my studio, I produce layered, linear works that relate the terrains of the desert and outer space. I use botanical imagery of plants collected around my studio in Phoenix and also from the Herbarium at ASU, where I photograph pressed plant specimens from the locations in Arizona where the planetary discoveries were made. In drawing the satellite images of Earth and Pluto, my focus is on the similarities of surface and texture between images of Earth and the dwarf planet Pluto. Pluto was discovered at Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona, and I have selected imagery from the Grand Canyon to represent the place of that discovery. After I combined the images, I placed a numbered grid on the surface, as pictured in the sequence of images that follow.

 

Detailed grid artwork, featuring stellar body laid over topographical map

Figure 1: Gridded satellite photographs composed by placing Pluto in the center of mirrored sections of the North Rim of the Grand Canyon

 

In process photo of transferring grid information from map to drawing

Figure 2: Here, I am using the numbered grid to draw each section from the satellite image.

Drawn piece, prepared for photograph.

Figure 3: In the above image, the hand-drawn piece is finished and digitally photographed. It will be printed as an archival Ink Jet print titled “Inflection Point II.”

Hand drawing with cacti digitally added to parts of the map and stellar body.

Figure 4: The digital drawing is then created using a combination of photographed and hand-drawn botanical images from the herbarium specimen pages. Pictured above is an early look at the process.

Close up picture of cactus

Figure 5: An enlarged example of the botanical elements in figure 4

Close up of cacti near both the Earth elements of the Grand Canyon and the map of Pluto

Figure 6: Finally, the analog drawing will be layered with drawings of plant specimens from the Grand Canyon. In this image, the plains of Pluto are on the right, the Grand Canyon’s rim is on the left, and plants from the North Rim region are suspended above the terrain.

 

As the above images illustrate, I will use the botanical elements to connect the experience of the planetary researcher with the sense of physical place from which the scientific research originated and to the physical world of the viewer. As a part of my ongoing concern for the relationship between space and detail in the environment, I am creating a connection between conventional landscape formats in art and the perspectives offered by the study of planets and outer space. By combining the two perspectives with detailed observations of plants, I am creating holistic landscapes that encompass the intimate and the vast. This connects information that we know but cannot see with the reality of the things we can see and touch.

Memories and Superstitions…

As I walk along the streets of Arizona, I note a few things; the vast blue skies, the reaching prickly cacti, the moody heat, and the ever-present embrace of the mountains. And though I have travelled the world, more than anything, it is these mountains I find that I can never forget. But as a result of their eternal consistency, I tend to forget that other people don’t have the mountains over their shoulder, at their beck and call, the way life in in the Valley makes you think.

As a younger, more innocent student a few years back, I took a study abroad trip to Spain with the University. My favorite city in the world, as a result, is Granada, home of La Alhambra, gypsies, narrow winding streets and copious historical cathedrals. Fantastic as it was to be swept off my feet quite literally by an exuberant gypsy for a round of impromptu flamenco, what expanded my mind most about that outing was the long bus ride home.

Our motley crew of ASU students was joined by a class from New York on the Granada leg of the trip. On the ride home, we’d began to mingle and discuss our new shared experiences. A young blond man next to me sat gazing thoughtfully out the window. I asked if he was okay…if anything was preoccupying him.

“Nothing…I’m just looking at the mountains…”

“Oh,” I said, and glanced out the windows. And then I noticed, a stark expanse of desert and mountains. It suddenly hit me, on the other side of the world, “It looks like home.”

“We don’t have ’em in New York. I’ve never seen so many before.”

And I can’t help but be surrounded by the mountains here, in the desert of Spain, on Tempe Campus, in the banner for this Superstition Review (of the Superstition Mountain range), and I realize how lucky and rare my life has been to be able to call the Valley home.

We invite you to join us for a while; keep reading, keep submitting, and tell us about your home.