Tuesday 25 May 2010

Pyromanic..!

If they were paintings, the work above by artist Lauren Gray would be gorgeous enough, but it becomes absolutely mind-blowing when you learn that it is all done using "pyrography"...the art of burning wood.

As described by Lauren, "Pyrography is the traditional art of using a heated tip to burn images onto natural materials such as wood or leather. It is a challenging medium to work in because the permanent nature of burning requires constant precision an missteps are not easily corrected. It is very much like drawing in a sense, but done with a hot wire tip instead of a pencil. The different tonal values and subtle graduations are created carefully by varying the pressure and temperature of the pen tip."

The level of accuracy, skill, and sheer concentration required to create such stunning works without the ability to re-do areas, or erase any mistakes is utterly staggering!

It would be incredibly difficult to decide which piece I love the most, and it's currently a war raging between my love of bees, and the breath-taking detail of the piece "Cathedral"(the woman's portrait above)...I also adore the image of the knot being untangled... Oooohhh decisions, decisions..!

Lauren's work is currently available on etsy, and you can enjoy her blog here.

ryan@abigail*ryan

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

That is amazing work. My wife tried wood burning it is a very difficult medium.

lauren gray | the haunted hollow tree said...

What a thoughtful feature! Thank you so much for the kind words, I am glad that you like my work!