The Beguiled

The Beguiled ©2018 - The inspiration for this piece came from a favorite illustration by Gustave Dore for Fables of La Fontaine in 1868 titled “The Rabbits” as well as the legend of the Pied Piper of Hamelin.  The background is a montage of two images taken two years apart in very different locations but blended together perfectly for the effect I wanted. Oddly enough, the rabbits (actually consisting of three rabbits in multiple poses) were captured in Pottersville, NJ, two of them on 7-28-18 and one on 7-28-17, same day, same town one year apart!  In Dore’s illustration, the rabbits are startled by a gun shot from a man hidden in the bushes with a rifle and scurry into the forest for protection. In my piece, the rabbits (and perhaps several crows) are being drawn slowly into the forest by the beguiling melody coming from the violin of the lady in white.  As the legend goes, in the year 1284, the people of Hamelin (a town in Lower Saxony, Germany) hired a piper (or flutist) dressed in multicolored (pied) clothing to lure away an infestation of rats with his magical pipe.  When they refused to pay for his service, he used his powers on their children, leading them away as he had the rats. While I’m not convinced my violinist has anything quite so sinister in mind, I’ll leave it up to the viewer as to the fate of “The Beguiled”.

The Music Life

The Music Life ©2014 - This still life was built around the lovely, old violin made in Germany sometime in the late 1800's.  When putting together the composition, the first thought that came to mind was the old joke "How do you get to Carnegie Hall? - practice, practice,  practice!" so the first thing I added was the vintage music stand from the 1920's.  Next came the Maelzel metronome circa 1900 which still works very nicely, by the way.  The vintage chest, books, stool and scarf were added for support along with a glass of brandy to help the notes sound better (or worse depending on how much is consumed!).  Last but not least the book, "The Music Life and how to Succeed in it" by Thomas Tapper written in 1891 gave me the title.  To quote the author:  "I am constantly surprised as I study the motive with which many enter the music life expecting to win success in it.  To be an artist one must live the life of an artist; the semblance of it will not do.  You must put heart in what you do.  We all reverence toil but toil alone is not enough; it must have soul.  In one form carbon is but a bit of coal, in another intensity it is a diamond".