I'm pretty sure that when the average American thinks about St. Pat's day, they are inundated with visions of shamrocks & leprechauns, rainbows & pots of gold, beer (sometimes green) & a really great reason to party it up. I won't deny it, that's pretty much where my thoughts went at first. However, doing a piece to celebrate St. Patrick's Day that was all about the kitsch & commercialized cartoonish vision that, sadly, the day has become... well, I just sorta felt "eh" about it. Which may be strange. I have an intense love for the color GREEN, (did you know that green occupies more space within the visible spectrum of light to human eyes?) & hello - RAINBOWS? YES... rainbows are awesome. Also, emeralds. Emerald Isle. Emeralds emeralds emeralds, I will never love another stone, not even the most flawless diamond, as much as I love emeralds. (Have you seen the 1958 movie Gigi w/ Leslie Caron & Maurice Chevalier? Of emeralds, she says "only the most beautiful emeralds contain that miracle of elusive blue.") ANYWAY - I decided to do a little googling & wikipedia-ing, & try to sort out some of the real essence of the day set aside to celebrate the life of Saint Patrick.
As far as symbolism goes, there's a lot more to choose from than leprechauns & shamrocks. Also, green, white & orange may be the colors of Ireland today, but long before today's Irish Tricolour was raised during the Easter Rising of 1916 & accepted as the official flag, BLUE was considered to be one of the sacred colors of the country, & there is even a shade of blue associated with St. Patrick - appropriately named St. Patrick's Blue.
I could honestly go on all day about this stuff, but really, who's interested?
So, on to my challenge piece.
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| tangles used: monaghan |
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It's fantastic. The colours are so nice and shiny. And the stuff you googled and wikipedia-ed is very interesting. I first thought about the celtic cross too, but then I tangled my tile with a few shamrocks. By the way: Do you speak German, your name sounds German. I'm from Switzerland and it's sometimes not so easy to write in English because I have not so many occasions to do that.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the great compliment!
Delete& my name is definitely German, but far removed from Germany itself, & I don't know any German beyond a few words. HOWEVER, your English - or should I say writing in English - is great. I would have sworn you were a native speaker before I read your last sentence saying you are from Switzerland!!!
Absolutely gorgeous! Very creative and wonderful colours!
ReplyDeleteThanks a bunch, Lonetta!
DeleteVery nice! I love how you incorporated the celtic cross into the monotangle. And the colors are perfect.
ReplyDeleteThanks so much Barbara! Coloring this one was a lot of fun - (who doesn't love juicy rich color!) but I wish I had taken more time with it...
DeleteKathryn, you were also one of the fellow tanglers that has inspired me to want to do a ZIA/tangle that represents the true meaning of St. Patrick's Day! I really love the work you did on this piece. And your description, it really left me inspired!!! I like to be inspired!!! Thank you!! And again,......just beautiful!!!!! :0) Share Humanity
ReplyDeleteGee, Annette, what a nice compliment! Really, you are too kind! & I like to be inspired too! Isn't it really cool how doing these challenges exposes each of us to each others work & all of our different styles & interpretations? It's like a giant recycling plant for ideas & inspirations! (minus the whole trash thing... none of the lovely folks who participate could ever make trash)
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Beautiful and creative! I like it! :)
ReplyDeleteThanks bunches!
DeleteLove the way you did this in Monotangle. Beautiful piece, and lovely colors!
ReplyDeleteThank you Kate! :)
DeleteYour zia is fantastic and so is your post.
ReplyDeleteThank you very much Miss Annemarie!
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