Deep Dive: Queen Bee by Kari Lehr

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Shop: Kari Lehr - Queen Bee

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Kari & I rekindled our conversation about art collaboration in May 2022, around the time of her daughter’s wedding. Inspired by Mother’s Day and the wedding, my goal was to design a puzzle honoring the transformation of maidens into mothers and matriarchs. Kari provided a list of her best-selling prints to select from. From those bestsellers, Queen Bee was an easy art selection. Within our own household, we as a family often refer to Heather, my spouse and our “den mother”, as Mama Bear. As driven action-oriented individuals, Heather and I have used the bee as a meaningful symbolic reminder to do less, and just be.

Riffing off themes of matriarchal nobility, I decided to pursue an ambitious experiment: to design a regal coat of arms and to incorporate it within the puzzle by “painting with pieces”.

After some initial research into heraldry, I set to work coming up with additional ideas, themes and symbols to incorporate into a coat of arms befitting a modern matriarch. Here’s a description that outlines some of the key elements, with heraldic blazonry terms thrown in for good measure in case it comes up for you on trivia night.

The central element of a coat of arms is always the shield (or the escucheon in the language of blazonry). In this case, the elegant shield features a field strewn with Alberta wildflowers (semé, in various shades of green, or vert). It is divided yet held together by a sky-blue diagonal cross (parted per azure saltire). The junction of this X is adorned with a core of golden ore, itself charged with an Alberta wildrose - a reminder to stop and smell the roses.

Four additional symbolic elements (aka charges), depicted in metallic tones, complete the shield.

• Silver Thistle: in chief  position; with its regal and colourful crown-like up-do
• Queen Bee: in sinister position, volant; symbol of nobility, fertility, hard work  & flourishing
• Golden Cup or Holy Grail: in dexter position; symbol of maternal holding and life eternally abundant
• Golden Hive: in base position; source and forge of sweetness, compassion and kindness

The shield is flanked by two supporters: sinister (left) a black bear and dexter (right) a peacock, both proud in their own beauty and majesty.

Below the shield, an appropriate latin motto is inscribed on a papyrus scroll banner. I considered a number of other mottos focussed on the act of being, but ultimately landed on this one:

Esse quam videri

The motto invites us “to be, rather than to be mere appearance”. According to Wikipedia:

Television personality Stephen Colbert inverted the statement on his show The Colbert Report to Videri Quam Esse, meaning "to seem to be rather than to be." It is also engraved across the faux hearth, above the video fireplace, in his studio, under his portrait.

Complementing the coat of arms are other noble symbols of transformation, beauty, life, and motherhood, along with 3 trillium shapes in homage to my provincial Motherland - Ontario.

Wishing you a Happy Mother’s Day no matter which day you happen to read this.