Kauai Woman Spring 2005
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Kauai Woman Spring 2005 |
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Seeking the Light Kiyo Braverman’s sculptures evoke hope and emotion
By Pamela V. Brown
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Beautiful faces of hope and serenity emerge from the clay – some tentatively, as if seeking light for the first time, others full of exuberance as if for life’s infinite possibilities. Both descriptions aptly describe artist Kiyo Braverman herself during different stages of her blossoming career as a sculptor. Inadvertently
discovering the joy and creativity that working with clay released in
her, Braverman, 59, began her career at age 50, while fully immersed
in her role as wife to fine furniture designer and woodcarver husband
Tomas and as mother to their two children. While on an anniversary
holiday in Mexico, Braverman unexpectedly joined her husband in a
course about clay sculpting being taught by a teacher from Greece –
and there she found her true art calling. “I just
fell in love with clay,” she said. “Clay can bend, break, you can
do anything, add things, take it out. It’s beautiful.” Though she was experienced in three-dimensional work from her years of painting, antiquing and putting the finishing touches on many of the pieces
built by her husband, this was something new. She began by producing
fish sculptures of all shapes – even fish ashtrays. But when she
began creating human figures and faces, she was captivated. “With
clay figures, a face is something magical,” she said. “You can
transform your expression to that clay and it responds to you.” The facial
expressions on Braverman’s clay people are realistic and emotional,
evoking strong feelings: the warmth of the sun on her reclining woman’s
upturned face, the sweet, melodious voice of the late Hawaiian
musician Israel Kamakawiwo’ole and sadness at his untimely passing.
In some pieces, each viewer may see something different depending upon
their own life’s experiences – hope, fear – such as in “Emergence”
in which a person’s face peeks out of a full-length cloak of his or
her own making. “That’s
almost like I felt” when she began creating her clay humans,
Braverman said. Testing the market slowly, tentatively at first, she
took some of her pieces to a Kauai craft fair and was amazed when some
of them sold. “I said, ‘My gosh, people pay money for my things.’
It was the first time I felt my own expression of my art.” Eventually
she was invited to exhibit work at a Punahou School fair on Oahu. The
first year, none of her pieces sold but as a result of that exposure,
her work was picked up by two Oahu galleries. In each of the next two
years at the Punahou fair, she sold a couple pieces, bringing her to
the gradual realization that her work is attractive, unique and
triggers people’s passions. Each
sculpture takes about 30 hours to complete, not counting firing time
in the kiln. Because there’s no mold – each face is lovingly
sculpted individually – each creation is a one of a kind. Never
formally trained in art or sculpture, Braverman seems completely
unaffected – and still a bit bemused – by her success and the
accolades she’s received, and still seems puzzled at her ability to
create as she does. “I really don’t know how or why I can do this,”
she said. Looking at
her piece “Metamorphosis,” which hangs just outside her Anahola
studio, maybe the reason why is to show the way for others to find
their own forms of expression. In the piece, two hands clear the way
for a face to come to light. “We all
make our own shells around ourselves,” Braverman said. “We tell
ourselves that we can’t do this or that. But if you try, you can. “I’m just so thankful that I found my way to express myself at a later age and that there are people who want my work,” she said. “At almost 60 years old, my life is full of surprises, You don’t really know what you have inside. You really should try it out.”
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All photos by Pam Brown |
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Contact Information: Pamela V. Brown (808) 651-3533 cell (808) 821-1027 fax |
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"Individuality of expression is the beginning and end of all art." --- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Proverbs in Prose |
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© Copyright 2004 Write Path, an L.L.C. and Pamela V. Brown All material, pictures, concepts, intellectual property and rights reserved. |
© Copyright 2004 Magical Concepts §©ª¨ |
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