Evidence of Scale IV, 2024 (GROUP EXHIBITION)

“I have nothing to say and I’m saying it and that is poetry”

John Cage, 17.09.1990

“Events, dear boy, events!”

Harold McMillian, 1989

 

Two works, Still Moving (FW22539) and Poor Us / Porus (FW22530), are my contribution to this year’s Evidence of Scale sculpture exhibition.

Neither work is entirely new, they originate in lapsed time, evolving slowly, digesting specific events of the first three decades of this century.

Memory ideated.

Both works have had various iterations searching for original poetic presence.

Material Distillations that might endure an extended period of time, sculptural essence.

 

Still Moving germinated in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks on The World Trade Centre in New York amongst the Tsunami of media imagery generated by the tragedy.

The work was carved, constructed and polychromed from intractable Ironbark, salvaged from local colonial infrastructure which itself was harvested from ancient forests along the Brisbane - Meanjin if you prefer - River.

Four male figures walk calmly, prosaic stuff when removed from their context, escaping the tragic events of that day in lower Manhattan.

Twenty-three years later the storm has not abated. If anything, it is more toxic.

There has been a lot to absorb while the century has surged forward; seismic technological, social and consequently, political changes have occurred.

What remains?

Are we ever more or less desensitized to that toxic flood of imagery?

In Ironbark, the figures have become historical anomalies since their first iteration back in that period, as no doubt their maker has? The “shock of the new” has given way to the incongruity of a snap of frozen time.

Poor us / Porous

We are surely no more or less porous to such ongoing traumas. Of course I can only speak for myself.

 

Yellow Meadow, 2024 (GROUP EXHIBITION)

Michael Hofmeyer in yellow pants (FW22162)

Pythagoras' Assumption (FW22163)

 

Evidence of Scale III, 2023 (GROUP EXHIBITION)

Spent time (FW21984)

That familiar yet amazing carapace, the human body, has been my primary source of sculptural inspiration. I think about sculpture as containers of the body of thought that has gone into their making. Because one work leads to another, each is an expression of the ongoing inner dialogue witness to this unfolding life. The appearance of each work represents a gradually attuned conversation between mind, hand and universe.

 

Continuum (FW21993), a part of the Pertinacity Series (2021) and standing at 2.4 metres, is a counterpoint to the previous small figures which I hope exemplifies that evidence of scale, and the detail which can be communicated, is not imperative to size.

 

Bronzes, Studies from Notebooks

After Dürer: Peasants Dancing (FW21990) and Study for After Durer (FW22008) are based on a woodblock etching by Durer, which dates to 1514, and is held in the British Museum. The wood block itself is postcard size, which given the meticulous resolution of its imagery, is remarkably deceptive. It remains unclear whether the highly skilled and exacting engraving was carried out by Durer, or whether he has been aided by an equally accomplished technician. Either way, Durer’s exacting presence has been held in perpetuity. Whilst seemingly unrelated, inspection of the engraving reminds me of viewing the complexity of the internal wiring of today’s modern computers.  It is these unique processes that enable our material world to exist, though few would be considering that connection, as they administer their daily life aided by their modern devices. Within the limited dimensions of the original 2-dimensional wood block, is the information which inspired me to transform the image into a hand-sized carving in wood.  This was an enthralling process, no doubt further stimulated and informed by the extraordinary resolution I have seen in Japanese Netsuke carvings.

For me carving retains the very magic, the essence, which I associate with the origins of sculpture. The reduction of matter through hand and eye, to the legibility of image. Whilst sculpture making has advanced beyond that elemental concept, those origins remain.

In a similar vein, A Rolling Stone Gathers No Moss (FW21986) and Study for After William Blake (FW22007), a matchbox size wood etching, after William Blake (Circa 1821) from his illustrations of the Virgil’s Pastorals, depict a man hauling a heavy roller, which put me in mind of Sisyphus’ ceaseless labour. Although the original illustration lacks Durer’s acuity, it contained enough resonance to encourage a rapid reinvention in carved and constructed wood. The scale here, for expediency, enlarges Blake’s original work.

Studies for After Michelangelo (FW22010) was inspired by a casting which I discovered in the sculpture galleries of London’s V & A Museum. Included amongst the many plaster life casts, is a seemingly innocuous, contained, yet compelling figure by Michelangelo. The original marble carving resides in The Hermitage, St Petersburg. If one takes the time to closely inspect this figure, it reveals a profound grasp of the human body. The hunched youth pulsates with life in every carefully considered contour.  The work can be studied completely in the round, an opportunity which highly influenced the early modern master, Auguste Rodin.  The crouching figure vibrates with the life force that has been masterfully communicated by Michelangelo’s hand.  It became for me, a dynamic impetus for drawing.  My small, hand-sized, carving in wood reminds me to revise my appreciation of the timeless Renaissance Masters, whose achievement is often considered dated by later developments.  I gained a new appreciation, both of Michelangelo, and the very modernity of the classical sculpture which had, in turn, inspired him.

A fourth, more contemporary piece, offers a vague nod to the popular culture which defines contemporary life. Study for Elvis dancing with Ann Margaret (FW22009) provocatively heralds an age of liberation that followed the cataclysms of World War 2. The challenge for me to translate, what is in essence pure energy, was as irresistible, as it was inspiring.

 

Evidence of Scale II, 2022 (GROUP EXHIBITION)

Pertinacity Series (2021)

If there is an animating principle at work on our planet, it is embodied in the capacity of all living things to briefly overcome gravity to stand upright.

That dogged perseverance to prevail is writ large in the term pertinacity, a tenacious perseverance that living invariably draws upon.

Pertinacity is used here as a title for this defiantly vertical, forest of eccentric upright forms (FW21258, FW21259, FW21260), inspired by observations drawn walking amongst myriad living things.

 

Gravitas Series of 12 (1998)  

Gravitas was a series of ten carvings (including FW21261, FW21262, FW21321) from salvaged hardwoods. They pursued a stream of consciousness arising from the monolithic clustered heads suggested in the weathered escarpments of Carnarvon Gorge in Queensland’s Central Highlands in 1998.

L’amour (FW21264) reflects the energising passion of that more youthful time.

Fast forward to the recent pandemic era where I reduced my motif to a “forest” of wavering vertical forms. That defiance of gravity being a register of life force in all sentient beings.

These tensions, arguably transformed by some sort of cognitive yoga, achieve new levels of consciousness adapted to absorb such perceptual dynamics.

 

All texts courtesy of the Artist.