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The new series of City Synthesis: Resonance continues in 2021 with Kosmic Kyoto [Higashi-Hongangji Temple Complex]. I saw this temple in person in 1985. I was attracted to the interconnectiveness and contrasting organo-mechanical pattern seen by satellite. Again, reality takes on abstract qualities and emotional responses when reduced to two dimensions and seen from a different architectural perspective.  Oddly, the plant island at the top left and the plaza shape at the lower right suggest, respectively, closed and open eyes. Kosmos [cosmos] is Greek for well-ordered arrangement or pattern later applied to the universe, an apt term for both architecture and religio-philosophy.

Still in Kyoto is the Imperial Palace. A portion is depicted in the follow-up In The Palace. 

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Completed in May 2021 is The Good Friday Experiment. Derived from satellite and aerial photography of the Vatican, the color choices are real but intensified, as might be seen through the influence of psilocybin as in the famous study [though I never had that drug, but did consume LSD in 1967]. Coincidentally, scarlet red and purple are Catholic clergy colors, for cardinals and bishops, respectively.

The work of June 2021 is Mosque. The source is the Wilayah Federal Territory mosque of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Its domes are pastel blue in hue; the hues of roofs and plazas and walls are shades of grays. The painting, however, is dominated by green, which is the color associated with Islam.

Vino di Soave, the work of July, is a view of the winery Cantina di Soave, in Italy, the name of a  growing region. The number and size of storage vats of this one winery among many indicate the popularity of wine in Italy. Colors in the painting are close to actual. When browsing satellite views, I was immediately drawn to the harmony and balance in the arrangement of shapes composing the complex,

September brings a companion to Airport. It is Spaceport. Otherworldly in color choice it is actually the SpaceX Launch Pad at Cape Canaveral, FL. The true colors are especially tricky to reproduce with computer software; should have a slightly more purple blue cast. Another companion, this the highway node West of Modesto, is December's Notorious 'Maze". It is nearby, in Oakland, California.

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Debra Jan Bibel

MORPHOLOGIES:
An Exploration, An Evolution

Fresh Paint

This page features the latest visual compositions, completed in 2021 and 2022. Because the page will change with each new opus, monitor the page periodically. The images may also be found among the galleries.

NOTE: All reduced and overly processed images fail utterly in even hinting at the quality and the true colors of the actual paintings and their effect on the viewer.

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The year 2022 begins with a straightforward retro painting of a skyline as viewed outside my dinning room window. Needing to keep busy while my creative Muse is away on December holidays, probably trying to escape the pandemic, I produced this small work by size yet with the continuing harmony of pattern and hue. A View to the West was produced in its actual color scheme, albeit with saturated and somewhat altered hues.

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Park for a Sultan is a painting of the Sultan Ahmet Park near the famous Blue Mosque in Istanbul, Turkey. The central blue endless star-knot is a fountain. The buildings in reality are uniformly gray.

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Consisting of over 14,000 circles is Zen. The work, when viewed somewhat close, dazzles. Taken from an aerial view of a river in the Amazon basin, with study it becomes more metaphoric. For instance, look for patterns and the mind will play games, pareidolia. Sometimes words seem to form, other times, different zones of light and dark, large and small, and  near and far are apparent, but the patterns shift around. Are the circles trees, or atoms, or globular molecules? The river arrangement is representative of Tao, of wabi-sabi. Thus, the relatively simple composition, like an Asian one-stroke ink brush drawing, opens psychologically and philosophically.

Temple to Democracy is completed on June 30, just in time for Independence Day, 4th July. The Capitol building and grounds have been much in the news lately by the Congressional hearings on the January 6th, 2021 insurrection at this location and its current political enablers. It joins Mosque, The Good Friday Experiment [Vatican], and Kosmic Kyoto in the group of key cultural buildings.

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All images are copyright by Debra Jan Bibel.  Permission for use in electronic media or for printed reproduction is required. 

Links to this website are permitted only if artist identification is included in direct view, not just within source code.