Close-up of one of the Fregata Magnificens drawings.
Five drawings, water color pencil and sprayed water on Hahnemühle aquarelic paper, 300 gr/m2. Dimensions: 295×50 cm
In our drawings, they fall, almost to their surprise. Their colors fade, bleeding out from the spill of water. Cross-inspired
by Turner’s raging seas and the exotic beauty of Audubon’s birds, these frigate birds mirror humankind’s overconfidence.
In reality, frigate birds never touch
the water; unlike most other seabirds, frigatebirds can’t swim, becoming waterlogged and eventually drowning if their feathers encounter water.
Inspiration
The Fregata Magnificens Drawings were inspired by our stay on Curaçao in 2021. The drawings depict life size birds, falling, who themselves seem puzzled by their unexpected descent.
Curaçao is an island with a past as unique as it is painful. A beautiful island in a fabulous location, but equally economically and politico-geographically vulnerable.
Thus, there is a fatal beauty in the demise of historically valuable mansions or buildings intended for increased tourism.
The frigate birds in our drawings show a vulnerability that humans should also be able to see in themselves.
Drawing on the wall of the ruin of the Koraal Tabak country house in Curaçao.
Frigate bird drawing on the wall of an abandoned mall in Piscadere Bay in Curaçao.
The magnificent frigatebird (Fregata magnificens) or American Frigatebird in Dutch, is a large, lightly built seabird with brownish-black plumage, long narrow wings and a deeply forked tail. The male has a striking red gular sac which he inflates to attract a mate. The female is slightly larger than the male and has a white breast and belly. Frigatebirds feed on fish taken in flight from the ocean’s surface (often flying fish), and sometimes indulge in kleptoparasitism, harassing other birds to force them to regurgitate their food or stealing remains of fish cleaning by fishermen.