Professor Elizabeth Ridenhower in 1970: She Who Knows All

When I was an ungrad art major at Trinity University back in the (yikes!) 60’s, my elegant professor, Elizabeth Ridenhower, told us something that has stayed with me for decades. I think we were looking at an collage I was trying to complete. She said, “You need to know, dear, that there is a difference between decoration and design.”

Oh yeah?? But I finally internalized what she meant  – in short, design works at multiple levels—functional, emotional, and aesthetic—whereas decoration is more about surface appeal alone. A decorative collage might use colorful magazine cutouts, sequins, and fabric swatches scattered across the canvas without much thought to their relationship. The sequins might be glued on in random places to make the piece sparkle, but they don’t contribute to a cohesive message. The elements don’t interact in a way that enhances a narrative or evokes a specific feeling beyond surface-level observation.

I reminded myself of this while I was trying to figure out how to resolve a mixed-media encaustic piece that came together by accident. This photograph of a white clay vessel was on the work table with an earthenware face and a piece of rusty steel sitting on top of it, just because that’s where it landed while I was working.

The bowl really is printed on a piece of paper even though it looks three-dimensional. I challenged myself to make a collage/assemblage with these two things to see if it could work.

I bonded the photograph to a 10×10″ birch cradleboard panel, and then attached the head and the rusty wing to the top of the board before I put wax on the surface. I added a chopstick to the bottom to balance the heavy top shape and to act a s a visual “shelf” for the photo of the bowl. So far, so good.

After I added two coats of encaustic medium, I started adorning the collage with little scraps of paper that had mysterious words typed on them. The idea was that the words were coming out of the bowl.

But when I put wax over the scraps, it was a mess – the paper looked like decorations, not good design, plus the edges were sticking up, and so I scraped the whole thing off. It may look OK in the photo, below, but those words just didn’t do anything but sit on the surface as a distraction.

So I had to solve the problem of how to use the idea of the words,  make them fit in to a cohesive, conceptual design — and then how to make the whole piece come together as an integrated work, and not just a few random elements stuck on a board.

Here is what happened:

I printed the words out in a straight column on rice paper and waxed them into the surface in two columns. The wax paper disappeared into the background. The words were now subtle and mysterious and looked as if they belonged in the piece. They were IN the surface and not ON the surface.

Much as I loved the rust, I veiled the wing shape with a pale chalk medium compound to integrate it into the object-as-icon. I did the same with the earthenware face and the sticks at the bottom. At this point, it became something believable and all-of-a-piece – something found – something mysterious.

You can look at the details and see how everything seems to come from the same unknown place:

The previous version might have been “prettier” with its torn paper decorations – but I am infinitely more pleased with the more complex design of the finished piece.

It’s always helpful to me to think of Design vs. Decoration – decoration has its place. for sure, and I can have fun decorating things.

But the well-designed artwork engages the viewer by creating layers of interaction between the objects and ideas. It offers a sense of purpose and invites reflection. The decorative piece, while visually pleasant, might lack that deeper connection and resonance. In art, the most powerful works are often those where the design allows the viewer to discover new meanings and emotions each time they look.

I hope Elizabeth Ridenhower is proud of me!

PS – if you have the patience to read a bit more, here is the narrative that resonates behind this piece, written by a pretty clever app — interesting!

In ancient times, a celestial being descended from the heavens, their face a symbol of wisdom and eternal vision. They came not as a ruler, but as a guide, offering a pathway between realms. As they moved through the void, wings of light unfolded from their presence, hovering above the world. Beneath this ethereal figure lay an ancient vessel, a bowl that had endured the trials of time. Its weathered surface, marked by the soft yellows and grays of the earth, was a container for lost stories, for forgotten truths.

The face and bowl, connected by their placement, symbolized the link between the divine and the mortal. The bowl, a sacred keeper of wisdom, held the weight of history and whispered its mysteries to those who sought deeper knowledge. Behind these figures, a series of words softly emerged in the background, their meanings vague yet powerful, offering clues to the seekers of ancient truths.

The piece, in its ethereal quality, became a portal—inviting viewers to contemplate the delicate balance between spirit and substance, thought and emotion, and the eternal flow of wisdom from ancient worlds to the present day. It was a story of connection, of the ever-present link between what is seen and what lies beyond.