Without making a sound or moving much more than her hands, Vira Syvorotkina steals the show from the formidable cast of acrobats, dancers and clowns in Zarkana. A projection screen above her blows up delicate, intricate works created and undone almost in the same instant, her quick fingers, palms and forearms turning blue sand into a luminous painting so alive you'd swear it breathes.
The Ukrainian artist also makes beautiful jewelry and life sculpture, is a champion in the realm of "body art" (turning live people into works through makeup and costuming) and is developing a mind-blowing technique of painting by puddling and ink-staining water. But sand is what brought her to the U.S. and into the Cirque du Soleil spotlight.
Six years into her mastery of the Japanese craft of sand painting, she says she began playing with it when she was so pregnant that it was impossible to make other art. All she had was a pane of glass balanced on two chairs with a lamp underneath. Now, on the grand stage of Zarkana Theater at Aria, Syvorotkina’s hands dance. Want yours to dance? The artist has some tips:
• Watch YouTube. Just as it can teach you to apply makeup, it can teach you to make roses with your fingernails. (Go straight to the source at Syvorotkina’s channel, Bogi Arta.)
• Soft, colored sand makes amazing paint, though you can use anything from salt to ground coffee to macaroni.
• Nothing is more important than backlight, because you need contrast.
• Everything is a tool: nails, fingers, palms, arms, elbows.
• Music makes you graceful.
• Starting a piece is about “dropping” sand with power, throwing a handful down hard so it sprays out and creates some white space.
• It’s more about what you take away than what you pour.
• When you do pour, grab a fistful of sand and let it run out from a small opening that adjusts with your pinkie finger.
• Practice every day, like an athlete. If you don’t work them out, your hands won’t listen to you.
Zarkana Aria, 855-927-5262. Friday-Tuesday, 7 & 9:30 p.m., $69-$180.
BACK TO: The How-To Issue
