Juried Work
Nataliya Vladychko - The Netherlands

Melon
Lampworked borosilicate glass, thermoplastic, textile band, acrylic paint
23cm x 15cm x 3cm
Fascination for the beauty and strength of a plant is the focus of my current work. I study and start to understand the growth process of a plant, beginning from the seed, by making drawings of each of the different stages of its growth. In this way, envisioning how to make the final shape in 3 dimensions becomes far clearer. For me, understanding where a sprout, a melon comes from, and which aspects of it's growth is important. That understanding I can arrive at by drawing, goes considerably beyond the ability to describe those growth stages in words, It is a bodily understanding, feeling the tiny forces that have made each shape what it is. And it is that bodily understanding, that steers my hands while I form the final shape in glass. I can then focus on the movement, the elasticity and the colors that are the right ones for each model, feeling what my hands need to do. Those plants I make then seem to become individuals, each with its own identiity, dancing and moving through the composition, at times independently, at other times, in concert.