Sculpture Symbolism

On June 7^th a statue of Edward Colston (1636-1721) a merchant and slave trader was toppled from its plinth by Black Lives Matter protesters and dumped in Bristol Harbour. 

On  July 15^th a statue depicting one of the protesters was, without permission, put in its place. It was subsequently removed by the authorities.

To bring attention to a cause by way of Civil Disobedience is not easy, as those of us who have taken this route well know. Very often it is left to an individual to draw attention to an injustice. It cannot be done in disguise or under the protection of a pseudonym.  Most prefer the safer option of patiently waiting for change. But if Rosa Parks had patiently waited, public transport in Montgomery might still be segregated.

The Bristol episode has not only served to bring home the message of the protesters, but also to illustrate that art in general, and public sculpture in particular, has a role to play in social commentary.  A work of art may be perceived as controversial, but therein lies its significance. 

The techniques and materials used by Marc Quinn are far removed from those handed down by sculptors through the centuries. However, to make the statement in record time I accept that it was the only way possible. I give credit the artist and Jen Reid, his model, for seizing the opportunity. As Marc Quinn stated, the computer generated black resin statue was meant to be a temporary installation. Its purpose was to continue the conversation about racism.

In terms of that conversation, it comes as a surprise that Thomas Price, a black British sculptor, who has recently been commissioned to create a sculpture dedicated the Windrush Generation, has accused Marc Quinn of creating a “votive statue to appropriation”.  He goes on to state: “I think it would be far more useful if white artists confronted whiteness as opposed to using the lack of black representation in art to find relevance for themselves.”

From that perspective it might be argued that 130 years ago Paul Gauguin should have stayed in France and not sailed to Tahiti and that 55 years ago I should have stayed in my native West Riding of Yorkshire and not sailed to the Caribbean.  

A different interpretation of the nude figure

My followers tell me that it is my interpretation of the nude that attracts them. As against pornographic nudes by the millions and fine art photographic nudes by the tens of thousands, my approach is altogether different. 

Nothing is predetermined; there are no set poses. My models lead, I follow. And what comes naturally comes and goes in a matter of seconds. Without a lifetime of working and speed with line and watercolour there is no way that I would be able to capture that fleeting moment. The result is set down against the purity of a virgin white sheet of paper: there are no distractions.

My interpretation leaves you the viewer to enter the creative process. I paint 70% of the painting, you do the rest.

Bare Minimum

Alterations by Will Wilson (1957 - )

Will Wilson is an American artist whose style might be described as New Classicism. His painting titled Alterations is in a similar vein to the paintings that the artist Edouard Danton made in his father's sculpture studio.

Casting from Life by Edouard Danton (1848 - 1897)

Both paintings perfectly capture the matter-of-fact attention that an artist gives to the work in progress as against, as some might suspect, day dreaming on the charms of his nude model.

In my book Notes on the Nude I delve deeper into the working relationship between artist and model. The human body is less alluring nude than when dressed. If one of my regular models had posed in the flimsy white dress she wore on arrival, I would have been lost beyond recall. But as soon as she took it off we were back to our work-a-day relationship. 

As a sculptor I can recognize every detail in Edouard Danton's painting and those who have taken a life cast from the model will relate to the concentrated effort involved. 

The same goes for Will Wilson's painting, especially as at the moment I'm working on ideas for my Caribbean fashion label Bare Minimum. The label's objective is keeping cool in the tropics and my material of choice is 100% cotton voile; a fabric that is light as a feather and semi-sheer. As a natural fiber it lends itself to dying. The gathered samples shown pinned to my dress maker's mannequin were dyed from the clay I use for my sculpture. 

From a different vantage point

I can best judge the worth of a painting or sculpture when I catch a glimpse of it from a different vantage point. The torso that I made from banana paper gave me a pleasant surprise yesterday when, instead of seeing it head-on, I caught a glimpse of it from below.

While the glimpse from below came about by chance, lying on the flat of my back was very much intended. I am forever bemoaning the fact that these days potential models have added too many inches around the waist, only to find when attempting to fasten a pair of pants, I had done the same. Clearly, my twice daily climbs to and from the river are not enough now that I have entered my seventy-eighth year. Henceforth, I will forego my pastry raising slices, cut back on rum and coke and do waist reduction exercises - lying on the flat of my back. 

Pandemic Poverty

 

A recent collection of paintings on the theme of the Corona Virus approached the subject from all angles but omitted the poverty that it has brought about. 

To fill the void, my pastel sketch is of the long queues for money sent to and from family members overseas. It is an everyday scene just across the road from one of the island's lavishly stocked supermarkets.  

The 14" x 16" pastel paper from a range of papers I make from my island's natural resources.

Self Sufficiency

One thing that the Corona Virus Pandemic may impress upon the world is the value of self sufficiency. I believe we may see a revival of crafts and a demise in office pursuits. As a craftsman I work alone with the unpolluted tropical trade winds and my island's rugged terrain and pure rivers for company. Not only do I make my own art materials, make my own furniture and sew my own clothes, I also make many other of life's less obvious necessities. 

When I was a child in the North of England gypsies came around selling handmade clothes pegs. They were sold as a bundle, bound together with elastic bands made out of discarded bicycle tire inner tubes. Nowadays clothes pegs are made from plastic; a poor substitute that breaks in next to no time. Except, that is, for mine! 

The ones in the picture are made from a Dominica hardwood that does nor easily split and, unlike some hardwoods, does not leave a stain when wet. An hour's satisfying work that will peg clothes out for a lifetime. 

Perhaps I should hawk them door to door and tell fortunes into the bargain.

One other love

Yesterday afternoon, while viewing equipment in a remote rum distillery, I was reminded by a friend that I had omitted one protracted love affair from my last post: that being my lifelong love affair with machinery - the older the better. It is firmly lodged in my genes and inherited from my father and grandfather. 

The opening painting is one of the first I painted after making a landfall on Antigua and the picture below is the gearing of the relatively small sugar cane crushing mill that I visited yesterday. Over the years I've been called in to advise on machinery in many of the remaining rum factories in the Caribbean, the most memorable being the River Antione works in Grenada which is still powered by a huge waterwheel. The owner was worried about the condition of the bearings. After inspection I was able to assure him that they were good for another 200 years.

A bonus that is part and parcel of this work is sampling the end product. Yesterday's rum was one of the best I've ever tasted! 

One love affair after another

After spending the last few days reading through old diaries I realise that my life has been one love affair after another, whether it be the girl in my arms, the boat beneath my feet or the painting before me. A romantic life is invariably an uncomfortable one but the discomforts that condemn such a life for many are the attractions that attract it to the few. My life has been fated towards those attractions.

The photograph was taken in 1973 at the start of a voyage from the Canary Island to the Caribbean. Nothing could appear more idyllic: Blue sky, a gentle trade wind and my five year old daughter waving to the boat astern. It says nothing of storms in the Bay of Biscay, a north-east gale off Portugal and an Atlantic crossing that lasted five weeks.

The girls in my arms have likewise brought their share of happiness and pain. And to that you can add seven children from my three marriages. Thomas Campbell (1777-1844) says it all in his poem "Freedom and Love". It begins:

How delicious is the winning of a kiss at love's beginning...

But by the second verse he warns:

Yet remember, 'midst your wooing, love has bliss but love has ruing...

As one endearing love and muse was fond of telling me: 'tis true Roger, 'tis true.

Making art, like making love, is 99% passion. 

The artist's experience lies so unbelievably close to the sexual, to its pain and its pleasure, that the two phenomena are really just different forms of one and the same longing and bliss. (Rainer Maria Rilke)  

                                   

Drawing from my series A Portrait of Alice

Digging deep into paintings from my past

If nothing else, the corona pandemic has sent me digging deep into my archives for paintings from my past; if not the original then at least in the form of a faded photograph.

Today's picture is taken from a photograph of a painting that dates from a series I made twenty-five years ago of Halifax, Yorkshire: the town of my youth. As I remember, the original was purchased by a young couple as a wedding present to themselves. 

The sketches for this series of paintings can be found in my book Townscapes.

I'm thinking

Whenever I go silent, whether it be while resolving an engineering problem or how best to take the mold from a piece of sculpture, I tell those looking on: I'm thinking. 

Some may have difficulty accepting that I'm ever silent. But the fact is that due to dyslexia I couldn't say a word until I was five. My brother claims I've made up for it since.

My current silent mode is connected with unfinished business. I'm rapidly approaching my eightieth year and there are some things I want to say in connection with the campaigns I've fought before leaving it be. Just as my grandfather Enoch made clear to my grandmother when they were arguing as to whether the lightening overhead was sheet or fork. My grandmother insisted it was sheet, whereas Enoch claimed it was fork. This went backwards and forwards until my grandfather, stamping from the living room said: enough is enough, let's leave it be...but it was fork!

Enoch Burnett (1879-1950)

If I gave trouble when I was growing up, my mother would throw her hands up in despair and say: you're just like your grandfather. I now take that as a compliment! His war medals were for "Work at the Forge".

To calm those who are disturbed

A child playing on the beach. One of hundreds of sketches I have made on this theme.

My mission as an artist is to calm those who are disturbed and to disturb those who are calm. The latter task is by far the more difficult one of the two. It seems that nothing is sufficiently disturbing to banish the apathy that pervades the lives of many people. 

Robert Henri opens his book "The Art Spirit" with these words:

When the artist is alive in any person, whatever his kind of work may be, he becomes an inventive, searching, daring, self-expressing creature...He disturbs, upsets, enlightens... 

This week has been one of controversy in connection with one of my earlier blog posts. I therefore choose today's opening sketch and closing painting with the intention of calming rather than disturbing. 

A rare painting of my wife Denise dating from 1992.
It was painted on the same Virgin Island beach as the opening sketch.

From different perspectives

The above watercolour is one that I made in the 1970's of Halifax, the West Yorkshire town of my youth. The photograph below is one hundreds that my brother made of the same town between the early 1960's and the late 1970's. What I attempted to capture in colour, my brother captured in reels of black and white film. His photographs are masterly and a unique historical record. 

 

For the subject of this photograph he has this to say:

I come from Halifax, and my West Yorkshire genes are programmed to find beauty in muck and grime. In the grey sky being reflected on stone cobbles. In black chimneys punctuating flat clouds. In mischievous curves creeping into twisted railway lines. A sack-load of art on the back of an old wagon parked in the shade of North Bridge. I took this photograph fifty years ago. It's all been knocked down now and they have built a nice new Leisure Centre in its place. There are probably inspirational pictures inside the Leisure Centre of mountain paths and bright green fields.

You can find more of his work at: https://newsfromnowhere1948.blogspot.com/