The Ebru Sea
Ebru, also known as Paper Marbling or Painting On Water, is an aqueous art producing designs with distinctive patterns by means of dyes being spread over a fluid surface and the artist's manipulations of the resulting colorful layer.
I got acquainted with this mesmerizing craft some years ago and was instantly fascinated by it, but ultimately felt a bit distant to it as a photographer. Something, which would change one afternoon..
While on a boat trip to a wonderfully mystical island in the stormy Baltic Sea, absolutely hypnotized by the sunset mood of the seascape outside, I suddenly could not help but be reminded of Ebru art. The ever changing scenery and the way it was manipulated by the constant stream of water flowing over the glass window, was oddly reminiscent of the unique nature of the Water Paintings.
As I picked up my camera I could also notice the parallels in the way layers created a final picture in Ebru and in my photographs. An Ebru painting is fixed when the artist transfers the ephemeral aqueous image onto a sheet of paper.
Likewise, the seascape was transferring from the outside world onto the thin layer of water droplets on the glass (as implied between the second and the third photograph), while being constantly manipulated into transient pictorial constructs.
Those to be finally fixed in time, creating unique "water paintings", by the way of them being transferred onto a photographic medium.
