“Sulfur V” – Marcela Bolivar

“‘Sulfur V'”
by Marcela Bolivar

To express my appreciation for this piece, there is no doubt that I would first have to admit that I do love its subject being related to fantasy, but to simply leave it at that would do great injustice to what elements are played with in “Sulfur V”.

The greatest of them all being movement. With the crashing of the mirror, Marcelia has been able to still give the piece a calming effect. This is strange since the action of a breaking a mirror should invoke a sort of restlessness (or at least one would think), but I think that there are some things to consider on how this was accomplished:

1.  Color: Colors are broken down into two categories, cool or warm. By Marcelia choosing cool colors, this already guides the mind on how it should feel towards the piece. There is enough warm colors present that are blended with the piece, like a sun gently touching you while in the shade, from keeping the mild colors giving the piece a dark or “dull” feeling. The warmest color, the streak of her hair, is what tells our mind on what we should focus on the most.
2.  Shape: If you notice closely, the fragments of glass are not as small and “sharp” in the foreground as it is in the background. In fact, they almost look like rose petals, but whether they are or not… (actually on closer inspection, it is a branch of leaves) they have enough soft edges and yet same shape and relative size to the glass fragments to keep the viewer from focusing too much on that.
3.  Layout: By the lady being a straight horizontal figure, we are made to feel like we too are standing upright and straight – no weakness to speak of, just a calm strength. To further give this picture a sense of stability, her hair is in a straight vertical line which is meant to give us that feeling psychologically like a bridge. With her hair being the brightest and longest streak, our eyes are guided both to her and the great detail to which Marcelia Boliver has given her masterpiece.

This is very enjoyable to look at, it is what makes a potential viewer want to see nothing more except what the artist has already done to give that similar feeling.