My favorite artist at the MOCA was Lynda Benglis. She had two wax pieces in the museum, the more interesting of the two being called For Bob. The caption read ‘wax on wood and masonite’ which sounds really drab, but the result was very interesting. Basically it was a slab with towering islands created from layer upon layer of multi-colored dripped wax.
Most of the colors used were fairly dark shades of elementary colors with some dark green thrown in as well. Had I created the piece I probably would have used a more limited spectrum of color to keep the overall effect a little less chaotic and muddy looking. Her other piece, in simpler hues, pulls off better in that regard. Perhaps a spectrum of warm or cool color with one complementary hue would have looked the best? Some of this also depends on the material being worked with; I’m not sure how well wax lends itself to being tinted or shaded and I don’t think you would possibly be able to get it very saturated. A spectrum of saturation could have also been interesting with a really vibrant blue on the top layer that fades to black and gray the deeper the layers go. I do like how she used color in the surface layer—the pieces fades vertically from yellow to red, giving it a fiery look on the surface until you look closer to the chaos of color underneath.
The texture of the piece is what makes it so interesting. The drips from each layer make them bleed down into each other without actually contaminating the hues—the colors don’t mix since the layers were added after the previous one had dried. It would be interesting to see how much they would interact if poured at the same time. She also adds to the texture with the towers of wax—their frequency and size fades in a spectrum across the pieces, giving it more for the eye to follow.
Overall, the piece pulls off well but would have turned out better if different colors were used.
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