Canvas #12: “Six Elements Plus Six Green Figurines”

Canvas Number Twelve brings ongoing questions and easily suggests all three elements in this “Twenty Questions”/“Animal, Vegetable, or Mineral” painting project I created.

​Read about the project through the links listed below:

“Is It Bigger Than A Breadbox?” ~ “TV Land”, “Saturn”, “December”, and “Parrot Wallpaper”

“March On ~ 2022 So Far”

#6 and “A Bonnet, Bouquet, & Bees”

7,8,9, and 10: “Skateland USA”, “Strawberry Fields in an Octopus's
Garden”, “Boxes and Butterflies
Under a Billowy Cloud for Canvas
#9”, and “Sea Turtle Café”
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“Fine Mined Minerals & Spooky Season”

My canvas #12 for this October of 2022 ( in addition to my painted canvas #11 also for this October found in the blog “Fine Mined Minerals & Spooky Season”  ) focuses on the elephant and is based on the parable about blind men which touches on the subject of truth or of the state of understanding or misunderstanding. 

Here is a synopsis of the parable I am referring to about blind men and an elephant found through the Wikipedia link: Blind men and an elephant - Wikipedia 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blind_men_and_an_elephant

​A group of blind men heard that a strange animal, called an elephant, had been brought to the town, but none of them were aware of its shape and form. Out of curiosity, they said: "We must inspect and know it by touch, of which we are capable". So, they sought it out, and when they found it they groped about it. The first person, whose hand landed on the trunk, said, "This being is like a thick snake". For another one whose hand reached its ear, it seemed like a kind of fan. As for another person, whose hand was upon its leg, said, the elephant is a pillar like a tree-trunk. The blind man who placed his hand upon its side said the elephant, "is a wall". Another who felt its tail, described it as a rope. The last felt its tusk, stating the elephant is that which is hard, smooth and like a spear.
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A review of this parable summary taken from Wikipedia is a reference for my design composition for this twelfth canvas creation. For canvas #12, I continued by then referencing a decades old "back-to-school" issue of a fashion magazine of mine and found this modeling fashion figure that I actually remembered from way back when I got it during my days as a student. This time however, when deciding to paint the girl, I changed her coloring a bit including coloring her jacket in deep blues and purple instead of a grey plaid like the model in the photo was wearing. I also decided to give her an imagined magnifying glass that I conceptually designed with a handle made of ivory.
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From this old back-to-school fashion magazine photo seemingly made to look like it was taken in a classroom,  I replaced a collection of fossils that were against the wall with a posted illustration/painting of a descendant of the now extinct Mammuthus primigenius and the only surviving member of the family Elephantidae. This picture of a mammal that I put in the room may of course be recognized as the presently critically endangered species known as an elephant.

​Next, on the classroom table or desk in the scene, I painted an additional feature of six little green action toy figurines in uniform.
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Finally, to complete the composition while tallying a collection of more animals, vegetables, and minerals, I transformed the hand bags that were being advertised in the magazine spread by turning one of them that I suspect was some kind of real or fake reptilian skinned bag and made it into an action figure sized wall. I then replaced the rest of the purse products with the rest of the isolated elements that the men in the parable mistakenly perceived when attempting to understand or identify an elephant. 
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Canvas #12: “Six Elements Plus Six Green Figurines”

Other blogs from this October 2022:

Halloween Top Hat 

All Hallows’ Eve Fireplace Mantel
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