These large-scale paintings shown for the first time continue explorations into the painting of sounds and music, in particular the visual representation of the breath when sopranos perform Mozart’s arias. The Vortex paintings are characterized by a single large, whirling helix dominating the composition and echoing the ascendant scaling sounds of an aria.

The form on canvas is created using giant brushes and tools suspended from the art studio ceiling. For this series, Verdier conceived of  a new mobile platform allowing the painter to stand directly over the canvas, laid on the ground, and to paint new, fluid expressions from its center.

In the Vortex works, Verdier captures melodies and rhythms of distinct arias through ascending curves, undulations, and frequencies that she detects in the music. The paintings radiate a sense of weightlessness, capturing the lightness of emotion and lifting sensation experienced when absorbed in an aria.

“This series represents the energy of man and nature brought together in what becomes a state of total immersion. The self dissolves into sound, into the environment, into the atmosphere. In my work I try to capture the invisible voice over soundwaves, to visualize energy and those things we feel but do not see.”
Fabienne Verdier