Harp of the Spirit
A union of fine art digital imagery and prose presented in panoramic wall prints and calendars. Michelle Stump, an award-winning photographer and digital artist, has taken this bilateral art form to a new level.
Artist Michelle Stump Describes Her Work
I create photo-based digital art of the natural world using a Canon Digital Rebel XT, 8 megapixel camera and Adobe Photoshop CS3 software.
My work is inspired by simplicity. The lyrics of the well-know Shaker hymn “Simple Gifts” express how simplicity inspires me:
Tis the gift to be simple, 'tis the gift to be free,
'Tis the gift to come down where we ought to be….
In the modern world today, we are losing the ability appreciate simplicity. We all discover the difficulties in attempting to create pleasure and comfort out of how many entries can be checked off each day in our daily planners. Happiness, joy, and pleasure can’t be computerized or reduced to an item on a checklist because they only exist in the moment. They exist in simplicity—in our very simple and basic connection with the earth. The message that all my note cards and wall prints carry is the same—awaken and reunite with the sacred beauty of our world.
I am also a poet, and I write poetry and prose for the backs of my note cards. What I write is a thought or feeling this held within the image, and it encourages the viewer to find and step through doorways in the images—into the realm of the sacred.
I have been described as “an artist of the ethereal” by art collector and appraiser James P. Bixler, and it is this that distinguishes my work from others. My images have a certain otherworldly quality that inspires people and instills in them a sense of the beauty of this world.
Autobiographical Notes
I majored in Fine Arts at Queens University, Charlotte, N.C. where I focused on the study of Art History and completed the majority of my studio work in oil painting. My strengths in these areas are now expressed in digital art based on photographs of unusual beauty that are often mistaken for paintings. It is said that my work evokes a sense of the classical masters. My main artistic influences have been Canaletto (Giovanni Antonio Canal), John Singer Sargent, and John Constable.
Originally from Washington, D.C. and primarily educated in the East, I also studied at the University of Vienna, Austria. In Vienna I was influenced by the Viennese Phantasts, in particular Ernst Fuchs. I worked first in Germany where I was a translator and taught English as a second language. I later became an advertising project manager with Levi Strauss in San Francisco. In the 1980s, my work took me to Los Alamos, New Mexico where I have worked since as a programmer, Americans with Disabilities Act coordinator, university instructor, and most recently as a technical writer and web designer.
Links
Harp of the SpiritGarden and Soul
Los Alamos Small Business Development Center
Los Alamos Multimedia User Group
