Jane Marshall

Animals and nature are recurrent themes in my art. Balance in nature and the fragility of life are conditions that inform the subject matter for the more recent work. Nowhere are these conditions more apparent than in the struggles for survival playing themselves out around me. My immediate environment provides me a rich inventory of visual information, be it bird watching from the back deck where a soaring hawk or a blue heron wait to pounce on their prey, the overstocked Koi pond in the front yard, the antics of two household cats, or the annual ritual of fall tree coloration and spring greening. These are the events and images that are recorded in my work.

For this exhibition I have chosen a woodcut reduction print, a ceramic work, and a woodcut painting that embody the aforementioned sources for inspiration as well as containing messages about our future.

In “Turtles on a Tightrope,” I used the turtle form as a symbol for longevity and as a part of the natural world. The figure in the background walking a tightrope symbolizes the (hu)man-altered natural world and how our lives are affected by these changes. Navigating this new world requires risk taking but also striking a balance between that which is beneficial and what may ultimately destroy us.

“Jungle Hunter,” is part of a series of humans and animals where both are often the hunters. This duality plays out in a series of sculptures produced recently that include the fisher/fish and polar bear/native hunter, to name a few. My intention with these sculptures is to illuminate similar behaviors in the name of survival that both species employ. The peaceable kingdom sometimes isn’t so peaceful.

“Blood Moon,” a woodcut painting, is based on observations made while at our cottage in Michigan where we saw a “blood moon” rise over Lake Michigan. To capture this eerie phenomenon, I did a series of watercolors of a figure in a boat, an image that occurs regularly as small boats enter the lake for fishing and pleasure while large ships come and go as they deposit their cargo. Other noteworthy occurrences of life on the lake are the birds looking for fish and rapidly diving into the water. Watching these activities take place during Covid 19 made me aware of how our world and our lives have been reshaped by the pandemic while the birds, the fish, and even the blood moon are unaffected and the rhythm of life carried on.