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LOBSTER GUT EXPLANATION

Lobster Gut is a narrow passage for small vessels, between Friendship Long Island and Little Morse Island in Muscongus Bay, Maine. My paintings seek to capture the complexity of the narrow, southwest, trending islands and their variety of colors. The islands have forests of conifer and deciduous trees and small mowed and unmowed fields. This combination offers colors from pale yellow to dark green.

The shores of the islands are intricate. One sees stretches of buff sand, blue-gray mud flats, seaweed beds, tumbled and fractured stones, and sea washed ledges. The color of the water sheet varies considerably when viewed from the air. Immediately below are the dark blue-greens, while closer to the shore, are the light blues tending toward transparency over the shallows. Most surprisingly are the water colors of pink, violet and mauve seen on the far side of Friendship Long Island, in the afternoon light.

To depict this complexity, I made a sculpture. Two identical square, open-ended tubes were made to intersect. The tubes have a width to height ratio of 1 to 1.618, a golden rectangle. The horizontal tube passes through the midpoint of the vertical tube on the diagonal. The faces of each tube are subdivided into a square and a golden rectangle. The golden rectangle is further subdivided into a square and a golden rectangle. This subdivision repeats until eight squares are depicted spiralling concentrically to a small rectangle, colored black.

Within the tubes are rectangular rods which have right angle bends at the midpoint, and span between adjacent walls. The size and location of the rods correspond exactly to the four smallest squares on the tubes, which are the eyes of the spirals. Each tube has two rods which are parallel but of opposite hand. To more fully expose the sculpture's interior, triangular sections of tube wall have been omitted in a regular pattern.

The walls of the tubes correspond to the land and to the water. The rods correspond to the links between land and water. The links are sand, rocks, seaweed and ledges. The sculpture was integral to develop the paintings. By viewing the sculpture from each side, I was able to yield a series of paintings. Additionally, by photographing the sculpture in bright light, the shadows were determined.

Malcolm Montague Davis

   
450 Harrison Avenue, Suite 313, Boston, MA 02118Tel 617-266-0460 E-mail mmd@malcolmmontaguedavis.comStudio visit by appointment.