Xiaohui Wang

Sólstafir (Not Unlike the Waves), 2020, 14 x 90, Acrylic, alcohol ink, pearlescent and interference pigments on stretched tracing paper, 4 panels

 

Aurora swims in the ether,  

Emerald fire scars the night sky.  

Sólstafir!  

Amber streams from Sol  

Are not unlike the waves  

Of the sea, nor the endless horizon of ice.  

Sólstafir!  

Aurora swims in the ether,  

Emerald fire paints the twilight.  

Heiðrún bleeds the golden nectar  

For the rising sun and the moon.  

The midnight wolves who watch over the dawn.  

The golden dawn.  

Sólstafir!  

—— Agalloch “Not Unlike the Waves”  

 

Inspiration of this 4-panel polyptych comes from Agalloch’s “Not Unlike the Waves,” a folk  metal song loosely based on Norse mythology. Both the song’s rhythmic and tonal quality and  lyrical imagery are interpreted into visual form through material interactions and highlighted by  different texture and reflectivity of the surface. The Icelandic word “Sólstafir” (which literally  means “sun letters” or “sun characters”) describes a meteorological phenomenon commonly  known as “sunbeam,” particularly “crepuscular rays” when the sun is at or below the horizon  during twilight hours. Using such a powerful phenomenon as the major concept, each panel  depicts an idea from the song of both mythological creatures and myth-related natural  phenomena, of Odin’s wolves and Heiðrún’s mead, auroras and sunbeams, the midnight sky and  the golden dawn, with a rough timeline from night to day across the entire piece. The vertical  form and tower-like shape represent the pole-like structure universally related to ceremony and  worship, accentuating the experience of awe as viewers walk around it.