Interview with artist Laura Vernon Russell

Title: Blackbird Thirteen Ways
Dates: 09.21.2008-01.09.2009
Where: Student Center Gallery, University of Baltimore, 21 W. Mt. Royal Ave., Baltimore, MD 21201

Laura discusses the inspiration behind her artwork (Once a fear pierced him...) and the techniques she uses...

He road over Connecticut

In a glass coach.

Once a fear pierced him,

In that he mistook

The shadow of his equipage

For blackbirds

...

Reads the 11th stanza from Wallace Stevens' poem Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird. Stevens' poem was the inspiration for 13 Maryland artists currently exhibiting their works in the exhibit Blackbird Thirteen Ways. Laura Vernon Russell, one of the 13 artists, was randomly assigned the 11th stanza. A die-hard bird fan, Laura's Once a fear pierced him... work is an elegant and intricately made 24" x 24" piece from wax mixed with pigment and photographs on wood. The poem was hardly unknown to her, Laura was quick to add, when she was invited to participate, "I've loved that poem for years and years. My best friend showed it to me...I don't know...15, 16 years ago, something like that, and I've always thought it would be really fun to illustrate the poem."

Image of Once a fear pierced him...