The Light of Liberty Will Shine On
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Stitcher: |
Joni Stevenson |
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Designer: |
Joni Stevenson |
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Stitcher's comments: |
I had been thinking for a long time about stitching a Tribute to 9-11. I knew I wanted to use the image of the Statue of Liberty and the image of the spot lights used for the one year anniversary of 9-11 at the place where the two World Trade Center (WTC) towers once
stood. I used photos of the Financial District to get the building placements, photos of the Light Tribute to get an idea of how that would look, and photos of the Statue of Liberty, which looks out onto the Financial District. I choose this setup so that it looked as if the Statue of Liberty was holding her light in honor of the loss we all experienced on 9-11. In this needlepoint, the buildings of New York City are the gemstones in the skyline; no stars can be seen because of all of the building light, so the buildings shine as stars in the night. The Statue of Liberty stands proud, respectful, strong and silent, holding her light high as a reminder that we are a strong nation, able to withstand any tragedy. The spot lights emanating from the site of the WTC are a remembrance of all those that we lost on that fateful day. Most of the hues used in this painting are shades and tones of blue-violet, blue and blue-green with some red-orange. The mood is somber. I originally got black canvas for this piece, but it was too overpowering and harsh. I chose a mixture of blue and orange that I felt gave a feeling of melancholy, sadness, and dusk, and painted the canvas myself. The colors of the buildings are dark along the horizon, though the metallic color is used to give them their sparkle. I decided I wanted them to sparkle and shine, not be a true representation of buildings at night with their lights on. The buildings are done in basically two stitches, tent variations and mosaic variations. I felt any stitch that was larger or more patterned detracted from the skyline as a whole. The Statue of Liberty was stitched with colors that make it seem that the spot lights are illuminating the side facing the spot lights. The only metallic in the statue is in the torch, the sheer size of the statue with respect to the skyline drew enough attention to it. I used tent stitch in the statue to emphasize the shading. The spot lights shine up into the sky, getting lost in the atmosphere. A simple couched metallic is used to remain as uncomplicated a stitch as possible. My intent was to produce a needlepoint piece of the 9-11 Tribute that captured my own feelings, not a faithful reproduction of the city skyline. |
