Engaging

Engaging (1st Piece in the Set)

The main character senses a growing awareness inside.

Distance (2nd Piece in the Set)

She sees a form in the distance and moves towards it.

Threshold (3rd Piece in the Set)

She sees that the form is an entrance, a threshold. It beckons to her.

Pivot (4th Piece in the Set)

She becomes aware that entering this realm will be pivotal. She feels both fear and courage. Something is calling to her. She passes two Dearg-a-daol beetles as she crosses the threshold and is accompanied by Ravens.

Artist’s Insight

These images introduce two characters from Irish lore: The Morrigan and the Dearg-a-daol beetle.

I resonate with the Dearg-a-daol for several reasons. Irish stories tell us that the Dearg-a-daol was once a woman, cursed by a priest to take the form of this beetle and be shunned forever. People were taught to crush and curse her. If they did so correctly, any guilt they bore for the seven deadly sins would be transferred onto her. As the Daerg-a-daol, she was blamed for failure of crops when, in truth, she protected the crops from the real pests; pests she hunted as a predator. 

She was misunderstood, marginalized by clergy, misrepresented, and denied the ability to use her strengths to benefit her environment. So much in my experience resonates with her. 

In real life, when the Dearg-a-daol is threatened, she raises her head and tail, creating a circle with her body as a defense mechanism. 

Stumbling across the Dearg-a-daol felt serendipitous. At the end of the 2020 academic year, beetles kept appearing in my mind, and I started putting them in some of my sketches. I remained unsure as to why beetles kept coming up inside. Before I abandoned the beetle idea altogether, I wondered if they might have significance in Irish lore, and there I found the Dearg-a-daol, a “site” in Irish culture where so many of the themes in my show intersect.

In my show, the Dearg-a-daol is a symbol of unused strengths and abilities. She is protectively watching, always there, silent, but so willing to help the main character on her way.

In “Pivot” (the fourth piece in this set), you can faintly see two of these beetles present in the image as they watch over the main character. I formed the circled entranceway by drawing the curled bodies of the two Dearg-a-daol. They’ve used their bodies to form a circle of protection — a womb or a cauldron — as the character (who is positioned near the bottom left of center), enters the realm. 

I created visually sharp edges to continue the theme of an emotional sense of danger.

There are also ravens in this composition. I will discuss their significance more later in my show. For now, it may be helpful to know that the ravens are connected to the Irish Goddess, the Morrigan.