“The Walnut Table”
An adventure into the worlds shaped by Tolkien
Tolkien (2019)
AFTER learning about Ancient History, Astrophysics, Oceans, and Death, DARCELLE’S next adventure was to immerse HERSELF into the creation of fantasy worlds.
Being a New Zealand CITIZEN, Darcelle was surrounded by scenes of Tolkien’s books: Lord of the Rings, and the Hobbit.
Darcelle embarked on a journey to understand the life of Tolkien and how he created the worlds he did.
it was at this point, Darcelle happened upon the film Tolkien (2019), a biographical film directed by Dome Karukoski.
after being so moved by the experience of watching the film, Darcelle invited Dome Karukoski into the 3 words project and received the following three words:
“Poetry, Memory, and Isolation”
Poetry:
Poetry needs words, and Someone that is known to be great with words is Tolkien himself.
the two articles below provided information on Tolkien’s contribution to the Oxford English Dictionary:
1) Fletcher, Rachel A. (2020) "Tolkien's Work on the Oxford English Dictionary: Some New Evidence From Quotation Slips," Journal of Tolkien Research: Vol. 10 : Iss. 2 , Article 9.. Available at: https://scholar.valpo.edu/journaloftolkienresearch/vol10/iss2/9
2) Gilliver, Peter M. (1996) "At the Wordface: J.R.R. Tolkien's Work on the Oxford English Dictionary, "Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature: Vol. 21 : No. 2 , Article 27. Available at: https://dc.swosu.edu/mythlore/vol21/iss2/27
Tolkien had been asked to help define several words beginning with the letter W. Darcelle attempted to incorporate as many of these W words into the painting.
Below is a brief description of how some of the W Words have been used to create this painting:
Walnut: A table made of Walnut Wood
Walrus: The animal depicted in this is a Walrus
Wander/Wild: a smaller Walrus is shown at the back right side (looking out the large window), the walrus thinking about wandering out in the in the wilderness that lies beyond the horizon.
Want: The walrus also sees a dragon in the sky. This dragon is what the walrus wants to become (the teeth help us see that this is a Walrus Dragon).
Warm: the color of the dragon is taken from the colors of the clouds during Sunrise.
Wait: All three depictions of the walrus in this painting are seen doing nothing but waiting for something. But they all wait for something different.
Waistcoat: the small walrus in the back is wearing a red waistcoat. A special reference to Boy in a Red Vest by Paul Cézanne.
Memory:
All memories come as fragments of what we remember. Much like dreams, we can often feel they disintegrate into oblivion. The walrus depicted at the front sitting across the table is a memory of the walrus thinking about itself.
Fragmented and dreamlike.
The real subject of this whole painting is the walrus standing and looking out the window
Isolation:
This painting is about the time Darcelle had taken to go “off-the-grid” in March 2022, to finish her 10-month course on Introductory Astrophysics. The room depicted in the painting is same room of residence.
“The Walnut Table” at
Hobbiton™ Movie Set Tours
Darcelle Nesser with “The Walnut Table” painting at the Hobbiton™ Movie Set Tours.
Polaroids of the Hobbiton™ Movie Set Tour inside the scrapbook .
The Walnut Table on a table
A 6 month adventure has finally reached its next point in life: a painting that has touched Hobbiton now in Finland with Dome Karukoski.