I'm very happy to announce that in January of 2011, I successfully defended my thesis and earned my MFA from the Art Institute of Boston at Lesley University. So many wonderful people at AIB to thank so I won't list them all here, but it was an amazing experience.
These three paintings (48 x 36 inches) featuring clouds moving through the forest outside of Kyoto are based on an obscure myth. First documented in the "Terrific Register of Crimes, Judgement, Providence, & Calamity" written in 1825, this book documents a report from the island of Malta in 1757 in which a black cloud that changes color and producing a "dreadful noise" descends on the harbor and carries off parts of an English ship. Similar reports to this appear in Edinburgh in 1904 and Western China in 1945.
I felt these clouds were uncanny, in the spirit of Sigmund Freud's essay of the same name from 1919. Is this a natural phenomenon? Do these clouds move of their own volition? Should we be afraid? I'll let you decide...
