I was raised in Kalamazoo, MI. It may sound like an old
fashioned cliché, but one of my favorite childhood memories is capturing
fireflies in a Mason jar. During the intense heat and humidity of those
Michigan summers, it was a great treat to play outside in the coolness of the
evening. After awhile, the fireflies would begin to wink on in the bushes.
In flight, they always looked like bits of snow to me – the
way big dry snowflakes look on a winter’s night under a streetlight, drifting
around, never falling to the ground. Fireflies are pretty ordinary looking
winged beetles, except that they contain a bioluminescence during twilight that
attracts mates or prey – children, of course, would fall into the latter
category. Also called lighting bugs, they are slow moving and easy to catch. After
a while I’d release them back into the canopy of trees and lush foliage… only
to repeat the game the next evening.
This is my first firefly – I don’t know why I didn’t make
one sooner! It is the “F” in my 2016 Felix Kulpa show. I am happy that it does
indeed express all the “fireflyness” of those magical creatures in my Michigan
backyard.
The materials are simple:
- A body of redwood rounds
- Silver-colored shoe tree wings
- Twisty wire legs
- Copper tipped antennae
- A child’s orange Japanese Oak croquet ball from a shop on Whidbey Island, WA
- An old Mason jar that belonged to my
father-in-law...
It has a light inside the jar, casting an orange glow from under the wings
My firefly has some good forward movement, too – helpful to
find a mate or get away from Michigan kids with Mason jars.
