Description
‘A Moth’s Dream’ by Phuong Nguyen
Artist: Phuong Nguyen
Title: ‘A Moth’s Dream’
Medium: Watercolour and Gouache on Fabriano 300gsm Paper
Dimensions: 16.5″ x 17.7″
Framing: Unframed
Year of Creation: 2019
About the Artwork:
“I started the sketch when I was in Puglia this summer and there were alot of mulberry trees at the farm where I stayed. Surprisingly, the people who lived there didn’t know their name and what they are used for, they thought it was just random wild trees in the desert that provide some shades in the garden lounge. Silk farming was not familiar in that region. And that where the idea sparked. Something with mulberry trees – favorite source of foods for silk moths/Bombyx Mori.
Silk moths are the one insect that I have very strong sympathy for. They produce some of the finest fiber that is considered one of the world’s oldest luxury goods, and have inspired countless merchants to cross continents and oceans to the East, where sericulture originated.
But the cost for such enthralling product is the very life of the moth itself. After many millenniums of selective breeding and domestications, silk moths lost its ability to fly. They never ever get through metamorphosis, the pupa is boiled to death in order to maintain the quality of the silk. Metamorphosis is one of the most attractive, metaphoric motifs in arts and literature, and it speaks of the possibility to cross dimensions, to reborn into a new body with higher, deeper perception. The very tragic image of a boiled cocoon is hauntingly symbolic depends on how you see it. I have my own interpretation, but will leave it to your imagination.
And with this painting, I want to weave a quiet, peaceful dream, of a cocoon that completes its mission; a beautiful soul will hatch, and finally be free.” – Phuong Nguyen
About the Artist:
Phuong Nguyen (aka Jacquell) is a Vietnamese self-taught painter originally from Saigon, Vietnam and currently living in Bologna, Italy.
Her works focus on feminine beauty and she works mainly with watercolor with a keen dedication for details and delicate brush strokes. Set in a dark yet poetic world, Phuong’s artworks embrace her oriental origin, the harmony between human and nature and how such coexistence embodies certain subtle, clandestine message.