 |
| Daniele da Volterra Drapery Studies ca. 1530-35 drawing Minneapolis Institute of Art |
 |
| Ferraù Fenzoni Drapery Study - Seated Youth ca. 1590-1600 drawing Minneapolis Institute of Art |
 |
| Domenico Fetti Study of Drapery before 1624 drawing Minneapolis Institute of Art |
The Guinea Pig and the Green Balloon
I approached the luminous stranger who came to me
from darkness in a gown of lettuce leaves, in a velvet
cloak of green that appeared at first another piece of dark,
but pulled apart into the glow-sphere that danced
in swaying steps, the lucent majesty that slipped toward me
from the reigning silence black above my cage.
Oh extravagant – and were my teeth too sharp to greet
or sharp enough? I do not understand now what was meant
to happen and what was a mistake – but know the bursting,
the sickening snap of ecstasy wrenched back to the body
and the green gown flung in crippled circles traced
like diagrams of wasting moons above my head – or portals
to another world, I thought, but as I thought, the shriek
dissolved, the body crumpled from the air and landed
on its side beneath the salt lick. All night I tended
the wasted skin and careful, brought it water,
alfalfa, made a bed of cedar chips and tried to gather
molecules of breath that floated from the plant shelf.
When I remembered morning, I began to cry, began to pray
for night to stay until the green took shape again
and if that shape were gone, I prayed for night
to stay, to be held in the same forever-dark
in which I first looked up and saw the gentle body,
and saw the graceful swaying of the stranger coming
as if for me – now I do not know – but then,
as if for me, and all my loneliness gone.
– Oni Buchanan (2003)
 |
| Jan de Bisschop Standing Draped Man before 1671 drawing Minneapolis Institute of Art |
 |
| Adriaen van de Velde Standing Male Figure - Drapery Study before 1672 drawing Minneapolis Institute of Art |
 |
| A.J. Defehrt Dessein - Draped Figures (illustration page from Diderot's Encyclopédie) ca. 1762-77 etching with engraving Art Institute of Chicago |
 |
| attributed to François Boucher Draped Woman, Half-Length before 1770 drawing Art Institute of Chicago |
 |
| Albert Joseph Moore Study for A Garden ca, 1869 drawing Art Institute of Chicago |
 |
| Elliott & Fry Portrait of Miss Constance MacDonald Gilchrist 1877 albumen print - cabinet card Art Institute of Chicago |
 |
| Edward Burne-Jones Draped Male Figure ca. 1888-91 drawing Art Institute of Chicago |
 |
| Yousuf Karsh Ruth Draper 1936 gelatin silver print Art Institute of Chicago |
 |
| Henry Moore Group of Draped Standing Figures 1942 drawing Art Institute of Chicago |
 |
| James Welling Green Drapes 1 2000 C-print Art Institute of Chicago |
 |
| James Welling Green Drapes 2 2000 C-print Art Institute of Chicago |
 |
| James Welling Green Drapes 3 2000 C-print Art Institute of Chicago |
