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'If You Build It..'
Haliburton Sculpture Forest : 2012 theme : 'Avian Fauna' ' How to add movement to an enduring form? My solution is to attract natural life itself into the sculptural framework. 'If you build it' thus entices the birds themselves to become an ever changing dynamic component of the work. The bloomery iron bowl at the heart of the sculpture is held up in a loose basket made of intertwined organic elements. Forged of stainless steel, these pieces will have a light grey colour, contrasting sharply with the dull black / surface rusting of the lower bowl. The uprights are stylized interpretations of two common Ontario road side plants. To one side will be a bundle of gracefully tapering rushes. To the other are a spray of my distinctive 'feather' forms, which are inspired by the reed Phragmites. Balanced against each other, the native plant and the invasive species. Who can say which is more 'natural'? ' bloomery iron, stainless steel &
mild steel bar
natural beach stones 3 1/2 x 3 feet / 7 feet tall Detailed Description (pdf) Projected cost = $8,000 |
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'Beehive Cell'
Haliburton Sculpture Forest : 2013 theme : 'A Secret Space' ' I was immediately struck by the though of an 'enclosed' space. Much of my own work is inspired and informed by objects and elements from history, especially that of the Celts and Northern European. The idea of a 'secret meditative space' made me think of the stone 'beehive' monastic cells, constructed by early Christian monks 1500 years ago in Ireland and Scotland. It takes the overall form of a loose 'basket' of uprights that define a roughly conical enclosure. The individual curved elements are flared and diagonally cut at the upper ends, reminiscent of cut and bundled saplings. mild steel pipe and bar hot galvanized coating 6 x 8 feet / 12 feet tall (9 feet interior) Detailed Description Projected cost = $20,000 |
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'History in the Wind'
Canada 150 at Elora : 2017 ' What is the weather? One of the defining characteristics of Canadians everywhere has been our discussion (often complaints) about the weather. Through Canada’s long history, weather vanes have had symbolic meaning, with specific cultural / regional styles. Over the decades, with my connection to museums throughout Canada, weathervanes have been a area of both interest and work. This has included reproductions of specific artifacts, new work inside historic design traditions, and extension into my own ‘windbile’ series of sculptural objects. ‘History in the Wind’, overall, consists of a series of individual elements, representing various historical and cultural traditions, stacked chronologically one above another on a central support. In this the rough form also echoes First Nations ‘totem pole’ memorials. ' mild steel, stainless, bronze and
copper sheet
mixed media with decorative paint natural granite field stone sweeps out 4 foot diameter / 9 feet tall Detailed Description Projected cost = $4000 |
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'Last to See'
Elora Sculpture Project : 2019 ' Life on Earth has been throttled by a series of ‘Mass Extinction’ events. ‘Last to See’ represents these events through a stack of stone slabs, (concrete, each roughly 30 x 60 cm x 7 cm thick). Embedded in each are forged steel ‘fossils’ - shapes suggestive of the creatures most significantly died off in each individual event. Individual slabs are roughly proportional to the percentage of species lost. Moving from top downwards, the slabs gradually tilt ever flatter, suggesting geological compression. '  mild steel, concrete stone block with black sand 100 cm at base, 60 cm at uprights/ 180 cm tall Detailed Description Projected cost = $4000 |
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'Fathoms 2022 -
Waiting Their Turn'
Elora Sculpture Project : 2022 ' Fathoms 2022 : is a play on that average depth of the oceans against this year’s date Waiting Their Chance? : Who truly knows what creatures may inhabit the depths? How do we evaluate the potential of a life form with an intelligence so unlike our own? The main body of the sculpture is formed of a number of dished plates, suggestive of a shelled mollusc like an abalone or giant clam. From gaps in the segments, fluted sections of the interior mantle project, brightly coloured on their interior surfaces. The shells have a series of punched openings, each containing a long knobbed protective spine to protrude upwards. From the lower edges of the shell emerge a set of eight tentacle like arms, the front pair forked to provide fine manipulation. A pair of eye stocks also mark the head end of the creature. mild steel plate and bar
lamp worked glass decorative paint 80 x 120 cm / 150 cm tall Detailed Description Projected cost = $6000 |
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'What Dreams They
Had'
Elora Sculpture Project : 2023
This sculpture superficially takes the form of
an Ojibwe Dream Catcher, here a circle four feet in
diameter. Quite deliberately, as a refection on Cultural
Appropriation, every one of the traditional First
Nations concepts behind their objects are rendered incorrectly,
specifically to indicate ‘European’ based contemporary
Canadian distortions, forms, and concerns. Following the
'Western' concept of ‘everything has to have a function’
the piece also incorporates a working equatorial sun
dial.
mild steel plate, structural and bar copper pipe, stainless steel sheet 'found' objects 4 feet diameter x 3 feet deep Detailed Description Projected cost = $4000 |
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'What Lies Beneath'
Paisley Street Sculpture Project : 2023 ' What gets left behind, buried under our feet? Does the remnants of our modern industrial activities become future archaeological remains? A large bundle of now distorted pipes and tubes is glimpsed through the gaps of a broken limestone slab shell. This work is inspired from my continuing interest in archaeology, especially the fragmentary view of past material cultures via the random preservation and recovery of objects. If there is any message, it is subtle : What we bury today will become how the future will see, and likely mis-understand, about us. A jumbled confusion that may not truly represent our lives and aspirations at all.' steel and recycled copper pipe
natural limestone 18 inches diameter / 6 1/2 feet tall Detailed Description Projected cost = $5000 |
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