It was about seven years ago that I wanted to do a series of six kimono-shaped graphite drawings. Each one would be titled “Night” something. This was the one I titled, “Night Passion”. They were framed in black frames with black lined grey mats and I exhibited them twice that I can remember.
“Night Visions” is the one below and when somebody I met in a class I taught in New Zealand said she identified with it, I put it in the mail. Better to do that I think. I just rolled it up, put it in a tube and sent it off.
The next one is another one I did not alter or give away. It is titled, “Night Tides”. Each of them was fun to draw and they made for an interesting showing all together.
I liked the adventureness of “Night Tides”. Hokusai’s The Wave, Robinson Crusoe tracks, sharks waiting for the boat to tip its occupants and the small boat drifting away from the shore leaving whoever it brought there abandoned. Then there is that big clipper ship crashing on the waves. Funny how a person can get totally caught up in an idea and just keep going until there is no space left and then they have no choice but to start another one.
“Night Fall” was rain with various leaves falling…bit predictable and my least favorite (now altered into folios for a book). “Night Latch” was a commentary on how safe we feel in gated communities surrounded by those like us…all safely locked in to keep the wild ones at a distance. I sold that one. “Night Watch” was a whole bunch of different owls crammed into the kimono shaped night sky. Later I over-colored it with earth pigments for a show.
When I finished drawing these works I photographed them for a record and then scanned those images to alter slightly and re-size them for illustrating a book I called Kimono Nights. An obi like belt is the binding as well as the closure. I loved stitching into the images with a bright red thread. Here it is below.
There is something about the kimono shape. It is more than a rectangle or square and always carries the references of man and adornment. I think it would be a grand idea to have a kimono shaped tent – a place to sit in the only chair placed inside and look up to see stars made of holes and all sorts of things going on inside the canvas as well as outside. I won’t make one. Then I would have to find a way to get rid of it. But I might draw one. I might sculpt one just big enough for one to poke their head inside. I might.