Carlyn Clark

Beginning in 2019, encaustic artist Caryl St. Ama, painter Margaret Lazzari, mixed-media artist Nancy Kay Turner and I began a collaborative project using color as a commonality. As part of the Hana Kark Collective we each worked independently to create 25 birch plywood panels, 6” x 6” each, in each primary and secondary color. We started with blue, intending to work our way through the spectrum. Without a clear idea of how we would ultimately assemble the work, or where the process might lead us, we began. We had our first exhibitions of the work, mid-process, in September 2019.

For the Blue pieces I was inspired by the epitaph on John Keat’s gravestone, “Here lies One Whose Name was writ in Water”. There is some controversy surrounding the gravestone and the meaning of the quote. Keats, who foresaw his death (at age 25) from Tuberculosis had asked that only those words, not his name, be on the stone. It’s questioned whether he intended the words to be a statement about the unfairness of his untimely death or a spiritual description of the impermanence of life, which he explored through Buddhist teachings. But either way, his friends, after his death, expanded on Keats wishes so that the stone reads: “ This grave contains all that was Mortal of a Young English Poet Who on his Death Bed, in the Bitterness of his Heart at the Malicious Power of his Enemies Desired these Words to be engraven on his Tomb Stone: Here lies One Whose Name was writ in Water. 24 February 1821.”

I used a satin stitch to create a border and used a punch needle to indicate reflections and movement in the “water.”

The punch needle creates a raised loop which I chose to put onto the back of the fabric. When I laminated the fabric to the birch plywood I left the raised areas of the embroidery unattached so that there’s a dimensionality and contrast in the overall piece.