Week #12, Joss Papers, Final Works from 1991 IV

Untitled (Brown and Black Abstract), 1991, watercolor on joss paper, 4 ¼” x 4 ¾”

This week’s work by Dusti Bongé was also created on one of the silver leaf joss papers. It presents us with a very different range of colors than many of her joss paper paintings, which so often tend to explore light and bright colors. Here she uses a wonderful range of warm, earthy jewel tones that provide an interesting contrast to the cool spot of silver.

Another interesting aspect of this work is that it seems to have two narrow rectangular strips of sliver foil, rather than the typical square. This means that Dusti here too made use of some collage elements in the composition, but in a much more subdued way than last week’s work.

At the center (and I mean center!) of this watercolor is a vertical rectangle of silver, which is flanked on its right side by a second such rectangle of silver. This second piece of silver is slightly larger and as such sets up an imbalance, where the central piece no longer remains the actual focal point. In fact, the larger rectangle creates enough tension to make it appear that the center piece is not truly centered, but slightly off to the right.

Perhaps the spread of the varying shades of warm colors also contribute to this tension. The darker, reddish brown, earth tones with deep orange accents surrounding the right rectangle overpower the light tans and golden yellows prevailing in the left half of the work. The exception here is the wavy stroke of of dark green along the left edge of the paper, which extends along the bottom and the occasional additional strokes and dabs of this green scattered throughout.

Thus Dusti creates a wonderful interplay of elements and colors in a work that is not even 5” x 5”