Page 16 - the NOISE MAY 2016 Edition

WiNGiNG THeiR WAY
FROM LEFT: Adapting to Change and St. Michelle With 14 Hands are examples of Jocelyne Champagne Shiner’s vast body of work.
StORy By
thE PaINtINGS OF JOCEylNE ChamPaGNE ShINER Fly WESt OF thE mOON
clAiR ANNA ROSe
Overlooking Heritage square, Aspen Loft Artists is a creative base for artist Jocelyne Champagne Shiner. walking into Studio Jocelyne one is immediately submerged in her creative environment, surrounded by samples of work done in a wide range of mediums. Along the left wall of the studio are large sculptures shaped from pieces of found wood. Opposite are assemblage pieces from recycled and found materials. Covering the rest of the walls in an un-crowded arrangement are fine art photographs, paintings and drawings.
A lino-cut of a honey bee is on display and ties in with Ms. shiner’s theme for her upcoming show at West of the Moon Gallery, “winging Their way.” A hope of Ms. shiner’s is to raise awareness through this show and generate funds through future shows to create way-stations and pollinator gardens for migrating Monarch Butterflies in Flagstaff. “I’m very concerned about the population of the Monarchs dwindling,” Ms. shiner tells me. A year and a half ago she began to research the monarchs, and found they migrate through Arizona. she read about a group that tagged the monarchs. By tracking the Monarchs the group was able to gather information showing the butterflies travel down to Mexico. “we are part of a four-generation sequence of migration. I read further Flagstaff has already been designated as a hotspot for monarchs, especially places like Buffalo Park, where there is a natural population of native milkweed and nectar plants.”
Ms. shiner can’t imagine a world without Monarchs, and wondered what she could do to help. “what I can do is plant milkweed and get other people to plant milkweed and make sure there’s some in the places the monarchs go,” she shares.
In the upcoming show one of the artist’s series features large graphite drawings of Monarchs, intricate in detail — the closer the viewer looks, the more definition they see. Another series features Buckeye butterflies, whose wing patterns resemble large eyes to ward off predators. Ms. shiner noticed the Buckeyes last summer when they would come land on her lavender plants and painted them with Japanese ink and watercolor.
The subjects of her paintings are local creatures, though every now and then viewers will think the birds she paints are an exotic species — some feature local Cedar waxwings the artist noticed when the birds were loitering in the gutters of her house.
while I’m visiting at the studio Ms. shiner and I walk from piece to piece as she describes the process for each work’s creation. For a series of assemblage pieces, she let the corks from wine bottles inspire her. The name of the wine lead to the name of the piece, the cork was incorporated somewhere in the art, and a hand-painted face would be the focal point.
St. Michelle With 14 Hands — Releaser of Butterflies is one of Ms. shiner’s pieces on display in “winging Their way.” The figure in the piece has a skirt made from a slide reel, and looks like a
circus performer. she has a bird on her shoulder, and is the base for an installation piece.
At her drawing table in the studio Ms. shiner has dozens (possibly over 100) foil butterflies which will be flying up surrounding St. Michelle with 14 Hands — Releaser of Butterflies. Because
of the amount, in the past, viewers have mistakenly thought the butterflies were purchased, when each one is hand made by the artist from the foils found on wine bottles. Reds, gold, greens and other jewel shades of butterflies are sorted into piles in various stages of progress.
To make a butterfly, Ms. shiner folds the foil in half, cuts out the shapes of the wings, and intricately embosses a relief pattern into the wings, so when she unfolds them, each side is a mirror image of the other. some wings have a patina finish, while others remain the original color of the foil, and finally a wire body is made for each butterfly. with an eye for detail, the artist takes great care with her butterflies — some look like butterflies of the imagination while others are distinguishable by species — out the vast amount in the pile I find a personal favorite, the yellow swallowtail.
Ms. shiner’s love for butterflies and nature started at an early age when she would spend her early childhood summers in Knoxville, Tennessee. “we rented a house on a lake for a summer while our house was being built,” she recalls. “It was a glorious house that sat at the end of a mile-long road, with a bunch of wild flowers in fields, and there was a boat ramp — just a concrete ramp leading into the water, where hundreds of butterflies would mud every single day.” At the age of three, Ms. shiner was so enamored by the butterflies populating her summer days, she told her mother she wanted to be a butterfly when she was asked what she wanted to be when she grows up. “I didn’t know you couldn’t turn into something else,” she says. “so I wanted to be a butterfly. ever since then, she always referred to me as her butterfly — so that’s my little love name from my mom.”
The artist’s love for butterflies remained intact through the years, and inspired her to pursue art. “I got older, watching them and looking at the patterns on their wings — that influenced me greatly in my decision to become a graphic designer as my career,” she says. she loved them for what they were — the natural beauty of them. she was intrigued by the patterns of nature, “The golden equation, how the spirals in shells work, how the patterning in the veins of a leaf are and how butterflies get their veining and their coloring — same with bees — all the way down to the little things.”
As a child Ms. shiner had an unlimited amount of drawing paper. Her father was an assistant manager at the local newspaper and would bring the ends of the newsprint home. The young artist would roll the paper out across the kitchen floor and draw. “I just completely had this obsession with crayons, the smell of crayons — I love ‘midnight blue,’ and so we would just draw on these rolls of paper when I was little bitty.” The artist never stopped drawing, and at the age of 17 she began to paint with watercolor. In her 20s she was asked to paint commissioned pieces.
when her children were small she often painted commissions of historical residences in Knoxville. “It also allowed me to be a very well-rounded designer,” she explains. “I could do my own illustrations, my own photography. Because I always worked in the healthcare system they thought that was a marvelous plus.”
After a while, working in a two-dimensional medium began to feel tedious to the artist, and she no longer had the patience for watercolor. At that time her husband, who was working in wood, introduced her to wood sculpture. “I made a jump to sculpture about ten years ago, and that was fabulous because it was very meditative,” she tells me. “I used small chisels and gouges to work; sanding everything is very physical. It was just so different than allowing layer after layer of watercolor to dry and get those beautiful articulations. I just didn’t have the patience for it for a while.”
After moving out west, Ms. shiner began to create assemblage art. “I still really enjoy putting things together and finding things that go with a face — I always draw the face of who the person is going to be first.”
Last year Ms. shiner felt compelled to start life drawing and watercolor painting again. “I finally found after all these years I had patience again, a desire to really focus on that.”
The paintings, sculptures and drawings in Ms. shiner’s “winging Their way” will be on display for the month of May at West of the Moon Gallery, 14 n. san Francisco. During the First Friday Artwalk on May 6 an opening reception will be held for the artist.
| Clair anna Rose has a penchant for winged things. clair@thenoise.us
16 • MAY 2016 • the NOISE arts & news • thenoise.us