FRAGILE

The fragile work of Atsum Izumi. Read more about her process here.

I've enjoyed reading Neil Gaiman's thoughts on fragile things.

"Stories, like people and butterflies and songbirds' eggs and human hearts and dreams, are also fragile things, made up of nothing stronger or more lasting than twenty-six letters and a handful of punctuation marks. Or they are words on the air, composed of sounds and ideas-abstract, invisible, gone once they've been spoken- and what would be more frail than that? But some stories, small, simple ones about setting out on adventures or people doing wonders, tales of miracles and monsters, have outlasted all the people who told them, and some of them have outlasted the lands in which they were created."  - Neil Gaiman, Fragile Things

Exquisite porcelain pieces by Atsum Izumi

"It occurs to me that the peculiarity of most things we think of as fragile is how tough they truly are. There were tricks we did with eggs, as children, to show how they were, in reality, tiny load-bearing marble halls ....."  -  Neil Gaiman

Atsum Izumi's porcelain pieces. See more here.

"Hearts may break, but hearts are the toughest of muscles, able to pump for a lifetime, seventy times a minute, and scarcely falter along the way. Even dreams, the most delicate and intangible of things, can prove remarkably difficult to kill."  -  Neil Gaiman

An inspiring video peaked my curiosity about Neil Gaiman. If you have the time, watch it here from beginning to end.

Porcelain sculpture by Cheryl Ann Thomas. See website here.

Cheryl Ann Thomas constructs her intriguing pieces by building tall thin vessels of coiled porcelain which when fired collapse and fold in on themselves.

Leslie Avon Miller's exquisite self portrait series. See the rest of the series here.

"The self portrait eggs are fragile. 
They have cracked but not broken, 
have been mended, 
making them all the stronger 
yet remaining open to new experiences. 
Treasured. 
Tucked into special places for safe keeping."
-  Leslie Avon Miller

Whitewash by Deeann Rieves. See website here.

Her Tattered Covering by Deeann Rieves ( embroidery, lace and acrylic). See website here.

 Detail of Her Tattered Covering. 

 No Longer Bound by Deeann Rieves. 

Lace by Laura J. Wellner. See blog here.

"Artists are not fragile, but we are delicate."  -  Julia Cameron