'Tonight I Can Write...', detail, Denis Brown 1998.
Calligraphy on calfskin vellum, stitched onto museum board.
Stones and fragments of engraved glass are attached to the surface.
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When I use vellum, I consider how to symbolically use the fact that it's the skin of a once living being. I select natural grained and veiny skins, which emphasise the animal origins.

Images here are details from a work about relationships and their fragility. The poem 'Tonight I can Write...' by Pablo Neruda expresses a sense of loss over a separated loved one. I transcribed it onto a whole calfskin, the skin representing a remnant of a lost being, (the calf, or metaphorically the loved one).

The skin bears marks of love (the poetry), and of pain (small sores I made by burning holes in the skin and filling with painted impasto). Stones are attached to the vellum. Hard contrast against supple skin, yet in harmony of texture and color.

Glass engraved with love letters lies in shatters against the work. Two gilt circles represent discarded rings, an allusion to Divorce which was subject of an Irish referendum around the time I made this work.

©2011 Denis Brown  |  www.quillskill.com