The Halcyon or Kingfisher, as legend has it, has the ability to calm the seas for the days around the winter solstice so that it may nest and lay eggs.This work is meant to depict a flying kingfisher, as it calms the seas over which it flies.I have used the nets of cubes and their projections to evoke this image. An excerpt from John Dryden’s translation of Ovid’s Metamorphosis is given below:
The episode that Dryden has translated in Ceyx and Alcyone follows Ceyx, the Trachinian king. He is resolved, after certain omens, to go by sea to the oracle at Claros. Alcyone, his beloved queen, begs him in vain not to leave. Ceyx's ship is wrecked in a storm and he dies. The ignorant Alcyone, at home, prays for his return; she angers Juno who orders a dream to be sent to her reporting Ceyx's death. Iris, Juno's messenger, reports this to the god of Sleep. Sleep sends his most capable son, Morpheus, to Alcyone in her sleep. Morpheus imitates Ceyx's ghost and tells her that he is dead. Alcyone, grief-stricken, goes onto the shore where she and Ceyx parted; Ceyx's body returns in the waves to her. She is transformed into a Halcyon bird by Apollo. She kisses Ceyx, who is revived and also transforms into a bird.
Lady Ponzi
(Dissection of an equilateral Triangle - Dudeney)
Acrylic on canvas
24" x 30"
Poolside
Acrylic on canvas
20" x 30"
Burning Banks
(Lines equidistant from an edge and a fixed point and the vertices and the fixed point)
