Prayer Box #1, 2007

This is another of my Prayer Boxes. I find I'm making them more and more often with specific people in mind rather than "just because".

Again, I used an oversized matchbox (11 x 6,5 x 2 cm) to work on. The first layer on the sleeve was watercolour crayon (reds and yellows) blended using a baby wipe. The second layer is tissue with a swirl pattern. Someone in one or other of the groups I'm in uses this tissue to wrap art, and it's one of my favorite art and collage materials! Talk about kids playing with the packaging rather than the toys...

For the next layer, I tore strips of handmade burgundy mulberry paper, which looks rather regal. Earlier on I'd pulled three pieces of colored glass from my stash: one burgundy, one clear light orange, and one in an opaque Naples yellow. They matched the colors of the paint and paper very closely. The idea I had in mind was to show progression and transition, the movement of communication between the worlds, and also to show the absolute (solid) and the shifting, relative (gradients and patterns) of the worlds.

I painted the inside and outside of the drawer for unity, then collaged scraps of the same papers used on the outside, plus a scrap of bodhi leaf, onto the inside. The box contains a tag booklet stamped with an alphabet stamp, to symbolise "the word".

I finished the box by punching holes along one edge of the sleeve and stringing through a spiral of red wire onto which I threaded beads as I went along.