New York based artist, Judith Braun, has often been the centre of attention for her controversial exhibitions. Her current exhibition is centred on a finger drawing, a 50 ft wall mural of a country scene, entitled “Diamond Dust”, which was created onsite before a live audience in the Chrysler Museum of Art in Norfolk, Virginia.
The title is due to the medium of graphite dust, which she used for the finger drawings. The carbon medium of graphite, when placed under extreme heat and pressure becomes a diamond.
Judith Braun applies 4 principles to her works: abstraction, bilateral symmetry, square format and graphite. This allows her work to be expressive while under constraint. She states: “working within constraints presents a proliferation of possibilities that self organize into groups and subgroups from which I then choose some to render carefully by hand”.
During the creative process she uses not only the fingertips of both hands but her undulating body motions which add another element to her fascinating work.
“Diamond Dust” is on view through October 2012 at the Chryster Museum of Art.
