Riverbowl III by Serena Kovalosky
Riverbowl III by Serena Kovalosky Image: Photo #1 - August 30, 2021 - This is the raw gourd proposed for the acquisition.
Riverbowl III by Serena Kovalosky Image: Photo #2 - October 25, 2021 - This is another view of the raw gourd for the acquisition. It has a deep, ancient energy. All the beautiful natural markings will disappear when I clean the surface. New and equally interesting markings are found underneath.
Riverbowl III by Serena Kovalosky Image: Photo #3 - October 25, 2021 - The gourd has been cleaned and an opening has been carved. The stunning markings disappeared from the cleaning. New, subtle ones were underneath. It was quite tempting to leave it whole and I explored numerous options before taking the first cut, a simple act that always seems quite unnerving. It changes the integrity of the gourd and I never know what it's going to feel like until I start working with it. Although it's not obvious in the photo, this piece has an ever-so-slight "wonk" to its shape - which I love - and the hole I cut plays with that. I am inspired to carve the INSIDE, which I rarely do......
Riverbowl III by Serena Kovalosky Image: Photo #4 - Gourd interior before cleaning, with seeds still inside. Opening a gourd is a bit like Christmas morning - you never know what you'll find inside! The thickness of the gourd is apparent in this image as well as the white lining that needs to be removed. Cleaning the interior is a big task.
Riverbowl III by Serena Kovalosky Image: Photo #5 - Gourd interior - cleaned.
Riverbowl III by Serena Kovalosky Image: Photo #6 - Gourd interior after carving. Usually I just clean out the seeds and scrape/sand the interior and leave it smooth. But since this Riverbowl is inspired by the Battenkill River, it needed to have movement on the interior.....strong movement that reflects the river's current in certain areas. As a filmmaker, I spent an entire summer on the Battenkill with a film crew during the filming of "In Search of Magical Waters" - a film that follows the creative process of waterscape artist and flyfishing angler Adriano Manocchia. (Currently in post-production with Artful Vagabond.) We intensely filmed the river (kudos to camera crew Kenny Hopkins and Jim McLaughlin) and battled those currents to get the right shot! As an artist, I'll walk along the river to explore the patterns of the currents, the stones in the riverbed and the way the sun reflects the moving water. These images enter my creative psyche and show up intuitively in my woodburned designs. I also visit calmer parts of the river for summertime swims, a powerful immersive experience that allows me to explore the river's essence. As a sculptor, I never copy from nature. I rely instead on how the a form feels in the body and that's what comes out in my work. Later I will gild the interior of this gourd with gold alloy leaf, but the next steps with this piece will be to work on the exterior.
Riverbowl III by Serena Kovalosky Image: Photo #7 - Woodburning. I almost always begin the exterior design work for my gourd bowls at the bottom. It gives me a sense of the "foundation" of the piece. For the Riverbowls, I have to consider the earth before I think about the water. Without earth to contain the river and give it direction, the water would spill in all directions and dissipate. Water affects earth as well, carving deep over the years to form a riverbed. So I start with "earth" at the bottom of the gourd. Hundreds of tiny dots woodburned onto the surface. Meditative. The tapping sound of the woodburning tip quickly hitting the gourd in succession to make the dots creates an echo which is amplified and travels because of the opening I made at the top of the gourd. My studio cats don't seem to mind, but if I'm outside, my neighbor can hear me work!
Riverbowl III by Serena Kovalosky Image: Photo #8 Woodburning. The "earth" foundation always takes the longest - hundreds of tiny dots! - and is now complete. Next are the river stones. They are among my favorite part of any river - tumbled smooth by years of water flowing over and around them. Each one has a story. I will often stand at the edge of the river and look straight down, exploring its many colorful "jewels" at the bottom, and along the shoreline. Their smoothness is a testament to the effects of time, even on the most durable. Some have traveled many miles. A flooded river means more may continue their travels. They always look magical under the moving water. If I am attracted to one and bring it out of the water, it loses its shine as it dries in the sun. Some I keep because they speak to me, but I generally leave them where they belong. Maybe they will share their stories with others as well.
Riverbowl III by Serena Kovalosky Image: Photo #9 After laying down the "riverbed foundation" of earth and stones, I worked on the actual subject of this artwork: the Water element. Specifically, River Water. This element is a personal one for me. I am a typical Pisces with a very fluid nature and an intense fascination with the flow of currents: those we can see (water) and those we can only sense (energy.) River water is always in motion. You will never see the same molecule of water again once it has flowed past you. There is a certain abundance to it; the water is always "new" and there is always more of it. The woodburned currents in my riverbowls are loose depictions of the movement of water. I do not copy nature. Instead, I start with a sense of the physical world and almost always end up in a more expansive realm as my pyrography tool travels across the surface of the gourd and I enter "the zone." The micro as well as the macro are intermingled. So rather than literal depictions of moving river water, the lines will also reflect larger, global water currents, as in major oceans, or perhaps the flow of energy. Often they resemble labyrinths. Always moving. This particular piece has A LOT of movement! The shape of the gourd and the position of the opening enhance my mark-making on its surface. Woodburning is done. Next comes my favorite part of all: gilding.
Riverbowl III by Serena Kovalosky Image: Photo #10 Working with gold! For this Riverbowl, I wanted to capture the effect of looking down into the shallow part of the river with the sun shining through the water and lighting up the riverbed. Sparkly and magical! To achieve this, I had carved the interior of the gourd to resemble the flow of river currents. I then gilded the interior with a brass alloy leaf to bring warmth to the interior and create the effect of the sun shining through the water. It took a full booklet of brass leaf - 25 squares, each 5.5 inches x 5.5 inches - to cover the interior of the gourd, requiring a meticulous placement of each leaf and carefully pressing it into all the crevices. It's very meditative work - which is why I never meditate. This gold-colored alloy leaf, also called Dutch metal leaf, is a mixture of copper and zinc and comes in different shades of gold, depending on the percentage of copper in the alloy. The brass leaf I selected for this piece contains 85% copper and 15% zinc, giving it a nice, warm hue that's not too orange and not as "lemony" as other alloy mixtures. As it is not a pure gold, it will age over many, many years. This is intentional to reflect the natural cycles of nature. Once the gilding adhesive is fully cured, the interior will be sealed with a varnish to offer maximum protection. Next I will pull out my REAL gold leaf for the final design work on the exterior of the Riverbowl.
Riverbowl III by Serena Kovalosky Image: Photo #11 Capturing Sunlight in Gold I used a very special gold leaf for the final touches on the exterior of "Riverbowl III." I had studied the technique of gold gilding with a professional gilder in London, England many years ago. She used a 22.7 carat gold leaf known as French JAUNE A.D. It has a beautiful, delicious deep gold color and I have used it in my work ever since. Unfortunately, it will no longer be produced, so I only use it on special projects, like this one. On the exterior of the gourd, which represents the surface of the river, I wanted to use this special gold to represent how the sun plays with the river by bouncing its rays off the moving water. I usually don't refer to photos in my work as I prefer to draw on the "essence" of what I remember rather than copying directly from nature. But for this particular effect, I decided to consult several photographs I had taken of the Battenkill River. I found that sunlight generally appears as clusters of golden dots on the surface of the water, or sometimes as long, irregular lines, when it's captured in a still photograph. So I applied the gilding size (adhesive) in round dots and long lines on the surface of the gourd, without knowing if the effect would be what I was after. I wouldn't know until I had applied the gold leaf, so I started gilding and hoped for the best. The gilding effect turned out perfect. With the right lighting, it shimmers just like sunlight on water. So the creative work for "Riverbowl III" is finished! Now I have to wait for the gilding to cure before varnishing. Then I will take it to my photographer, Jim McLaughlin, to have it professionally photographed.
  • Serena Kovalosky
  • Riverbowl III, 2022
  • Gourd, pyrography, brass alloy gilding, 22.7 carat gold gilding.
  • 9.5 x 12.5 x 12.5 in
  • Signature: Signed in pyrography by Serena Kovalosky on the bottom of the gourd. Signed as: KOVALOSKY in caps.
  • $1,200
  • Sold
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"Riverbowl III" explores the element of water. My Riverbowls are inspired by the many rivers I’ve encountered throughout my life. Since I never copy directly from nature, they are usually not focused on a particular river, but this Riverbowl is inspired by the Battenkill River which flows into upstate New York from Vermont as a tributary of the Hudson River.

Click on the captioned photos for the full story of the creation and inspiration behind this piece.

"Riverbowl III" was acquired in 2022 for the permanent collection at The Folklife Center at Crandall Library in Glens Falls, New York.

Photo credit: mclaughlinphoto.com

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Cow Spots (Guernsey) by Serena Kovalosky
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