Strange Fruit

Ah! These strange fruit tell such stories - of passion and poison, temptation and tears, seeds, snakes and stars; of Persephone, Snow White and Eve; the nameless Handless Maiden and the King's pear garden... Please take a bite and be transformed, your decision may have dire consequences but it will certainly change your life - with knowledge, love and even death...

This is a mini exhibition running alongside my gallery's Summer show, welcoming in the first fruits of the autumn to come. Something inspired by some paintings I was doing and the work of some of our wonderful artists...

P is for Pomegranate (c) Sarah Booth

Pink Pom (c) Sarah Booth

Pink Pom (c) Sarah Booth

Strange Fruit Triptych (c) Amber Caspian, 2012

Golden Pear (c) Amber Caspian, 2011

James and The Giant Peach  (c) Celeste Copping  

Not the most cohesive show I've done to date, more the germ of an idea ripening slowly, so I added some flower lamps and glass flowers into the mix to fill the space.  However, it is a project I intend to continue myself and hope to exhibit...

Persephone Pomegranates

This idea came to me last year while doodling on envelopes again...

Persephones, biro sketches (c) Amber Caspian, 2012

Persephone's pretty face telling her own story represented by that strange fruit,

the Pomegranate, now so much a part of her.  

Pomegranate and Persephones, watercolour (c) Amber Caspian, 2012

In that fruit I saw her red hair and a crown,

Three Crowns (c) Amber Caspian, 2012

...and her expression saying everything about...

Pomegranate Expressions (c) Amber Caspian, 2012

...the temptations of being a young maid growing to womanhood...

Tempt (c) Amber Caspian, 2012

...who gently teases, with wide eyed naivety, those who would save her from herself...

Tease (c) Amber Caspian, 2012

...and later is torn between the bright realm of her mother and the dark realm of her husband -

Torn (c) Amber Caspian, 2012

In one she is a child again, alive and dancing in the summer meadows...

Strange Fruit Triptych (c) Amber Caspian, 2012

...in the other she is a woman and Queen of the Underworld, with its own price.

...and Names

Welcome to ‘The Spinney’! 

'The Spinney' © Amber Caspian, 2012

Spinney - 1590s, from O.Fr. espinei “place full of thorns and brambles,” from espine, see spine
Spine - c.1400, "backbone," later "thornlike part" (early 15c.), from O.Fr. espine  (Fr. épine), from L. spina "backbone," originally "thorn, prickle," from PIE *spei- "sharp point" (cf. L. spica "ear of corn,")*

I chose this name for my studio because I wanted something evocative, that spoke of a hidden place where creative and magical things happen. Perhaps the home of one of my witches deep within a fairy tale, and what could be more fairy tale-esque than thorns and brambles?  It made me think of the roses motif that appear so often in these old tales along with wicked witches and a tangle of tasks that need to be completed by some poor girl.  So there's another link, this time with the idea behind The Tanglewood where I gather and untangle the threads of my passions and hope I get to the point, strengthen the backbone of my potential, within the ear of corn, the centre of myself.

So the Spinney Witch lives deep in the dark heart of The Tanglewood
 and weaves stories from the tangled dreams of strangers,
young girls on the verge of womanhood, and wolves...

*Online Etymology Dictionary

Weather Vanes...

The crowning glory!