“Scheherazade (Desert Song”) is a sister piece to “Araby”. The idea for it came to Parhelion as soon as he saw the first strokes of black on yellow paint on the canvas, like calligraphy on a page. He decided then to use those colours and approach in a later work, and thought that the story of Scheherazade and her “Tales of 1,001 Nights” was the perfect theme, as a companion to “Araby”. The painting seeks to present the lyricism, beauty, and poetry of the stories of “1,001 Nights” through the relationship of rhythmic tension, stress and release, in its internal elements of pattern and line. The painting vibrates with the cadence of a story, a poem, a dance, or a (desert) song.
