Lotus
The other week I took some glycerin and diluted it well with water. The porcelain, butcher’s tray, doesn’t show you the water. What you do see is the dry lotus leaf beginning to rehydrate.
What is imagined as a flat circular leaf floating on top of the water is, in fact, a shallow cone shape when dried. There is no way to open it fully.
The beautiful drops of water happen because of a natural film on the leaf.
It eventually, over a few days, softened enough to either make a print or to make joan, a chinese tamale, that one can still find in big city dim sum lunch rooms. I have eaten them. I do eat the lotus root.
I chose to make a print so that I could carve a linoleum block.
The one picture of all the lotus root was out of focus. You can see here, one uncut segment and some slices that were used to print.
I went looking for the lotus symbolism. I decided it was going to be a week long research job. Not today. There is something about the lotus there for me.
I had to get the print work done as I was going to lose the lotus root; it survives a long time in my refrigerator but not forever.
Since I working on another project and trying to get it finished up, I laid the linoleum blocks away to be carved another day.
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Hi Thelma!
I’ve been meaning to get an e-mail off to you since I got back but my e-mail function went bad. I’m so glad you liked the kimono.
Where do you get your lotus leaf? Do the come to you dried? Do they grow where you are? Yesterday I just wrote about the lotus fields near us but didn’t get a picture of the root itself so I was thrilled to see one on your blog!
Hope you’re having a good summer.
Love, Tanya
I can see why you wanted to do this…these shapes are lovely.
Tanya, I get the lotus leaf at the seventeenth street market in tucson. I have only seen them once and scooped up the packet; they are dry and brittle.
I envy you your lotus fields. We have eleven inches of rain in a good year. There are a few places where there are fresh water such as the Buenos Aires National Wildlife Area. However, I doubt that lotus is native.
You have no idea how thrilled I am with the kimono. Thank you, again.
Tanya, it took hours for my brain to come up with the local spanish for the kind of wet spot that could support lotus in this environment. La Cienaga, the bog or the swamp.