How exciting, I have just discovered a couple of basic tools on my laptop but they can allow be to get a little more creative with my photos. It’s a little different when you find out you are pregnant you are excited but a whole range of emotions floods your mind. I didn’t think or wasn’t aware of sculptors who had made ‘the pregnant woman’ but just shocked myself in my search. This abstract figure is a much more beautiful way of considering the pregnant female than some of the realistic sculptures out there.
Often there is an expectation from the viewer that an artist should be giving the viewer something it can understand, a true representation. We don’t easily let ourselves ‘open up’ to think outside the boxes we constrain our minds in.
Keeping it short today as there are too many new apps and other blog discoveries to look at and who knows how long my baby will sleep for!?
Exhibition fever has died down a little but I haven’t yet shown you all the pieces that were in the show. This one then, is a most recent piece and is both the outline of a face and an upright figure standing with arms up in the air. I have to blow my own trumpet for once and speak of my contribution to this piece.
My husband was sketching and had come up with an idea for a new steel figure with arms outstretched. He had placed it on the kitchen table, I could see the figure but I also saw a profile of a face. Excited by this he quickly did a few more sketches altering the shapes slightly and here we are.
It has just reminded me of those clever pschological test where there is an image of something but can also be something else, an old lady and a young woman in one, a vase or two people, you know the ones I mean?
It’s know as the Gestalt effect and is the “form-generating capability of our senses” more often with the visual recognition of figures and whole forms instead of just a collection of simple lines and curves. The other thing it makes me think about is that sometimes we can see things one way and it may work out in another. My husband was just telling me a story about that very same idea this evening. Forgive me, I will paraphrase and hope it still has the same effect:
A woman makes her income from knitting to support her young family. One day on the way to market a bird pinches her knitting and flies off with it. The woman is beside herself so she goes to see a wise and learned man. She tells him how God is unfair and of her story.
At the same moment there is a knock on the door. A man enters, apologies for the interruption but insists that he has money from him and his men that needs to be distributed to the poor. He explains that they were out at sea and their boat had a hole. They had tried every way of filling it but to no avail, when a bird flew over head and dropped a pile of knitting in the boat. The men managed to block their hole in the boat with this knitting and so out of thankfulness each man wanted to donate some money to those who needed it more than they.
I feel I need not add the punch line. Sometimes things happen to us, we may see it one way but in reality it is meant for us in another.
This piece entitled ‘You’ was also in the exhibition and SOLD ! So we are very excited. It is currently being collected by courier and off to a new home.
The outline of face, a portrait in many ways, made of mirrored steel; it reflects the space it occupies and also the viewer, consequently when you look at it you see yourself. The philosophy therefore is about self-reflection. “The self is an individual person as the object of his or her own reflective consciousness” (Wikipedia).
This follows on quite nicely from my last blog about what our weakness are and how far we would/could go to get the things we want. We often judge others but how often do we look at ourselves and change, really take time to self evaluate and improve.
The topic of ‘Self’ is a huge one and often discussed in psychological and philosophical debates. The ‘self’ can be described as “the organized, consistent, conceptual gestalt composed of perceptions of the characteristics of the “I” or “me” and the perceptions of the relationships of the “I” or “me” to others and to various aspects of life, together with the values attached to these perceptions”. (Rogers, 1959)
Are we ever aware of how other’s really see us? What they think about us? Does it matter?
We often rarely see our own faces. I have been aware that looking at my husband is more like seeing myself than at my own reflection. There is a theory that couples do start to look like each other as they get older – how does that happen!? The way we behave does have an impact on others, especially those we live with. ‘Children learn what they live’, ‘Actions speak louder than words’, our behaviour is reflected on those around us and reflects back on us.
You have an idea of how things should be in the world and how you should be in the world. This is mixed up with your own personality and specific events making up what you think is ‘you’ and your world. It can be similar to your neighbour or very different.
” If you desire to know reality you must know yourself. You are the key, the only key to reality. You are nothing but a mirror of reality. It is enough to reflect…..~”
This piece is currently on show in the exhibition which is on until the end of this weekend.
The philosophy behind this is quite apt considering something which happened this week which made me think more about the idea.
What’s your weakness? What would you do in order to get something you wanted or needed?
This week I was so convinced of something coming through for my son which didn’t. It made me wonder what you would do if you really wanted to fight for something.
The point of this piece then, is that sex has become a key to a lot of things. It is and has a big impact in today’s society. We may think we have overcome certain limitations imposed in the past but have we? really? Magazines are constantly writing articles about dieting, fashion, sexuality, relationships and at the same time padding out their volumes with adverts and promotions with highly made up, airbrushed and toned young women. Open the newspaper and see an image of a naked woman. Sex sells, to both male and female.
Then there is the topic of sexuality, which is so much more overtly displayed now, so openly spoken about. Where has our innocence, our modesty, our self-respect gone?
Money and power have and still are objects of desire but in today’s society, sex is the weakness and the strongest drive in humanity.
I am trying to recall the conversation my husband and I had about this piece when he was explaining it to me, something along the lines of; Everyone has a key holder with a bunch of key’s on it. There will be one key which the key holder will be able to unlock the door to something. Look at Clinton, he had power and money, what was his weakness.
My Husband at the opening of the exhibition, one of his pieces in the foregroundOpening nightMy Husband at the opening
I was going to try to have ‘sculpture’ only images but it is hard not to put these images in as they give a flavour of ‘Opening night’. It also means I can review so far without going into too much detail about the individual pieces. My husband has been talking non stop about it and all his ideas about the next step. His work was really well accepted and appreciated. He met lots of interesting and creative people. He received positive feedback and that has been so encouraging and a boost to source the next show….(offers of Milan and New York!) One step at a time! Managers of the bronze age foundry (where he had visited in the afternoon) attended and were interested to see his none bronze work and have been really helpful in suggesting some other galleries and spaces to contact.
The space was in all honestly a bit limiting for sculpture, there wasn’t the ability to take a 360 degree view of the work which each piece definitely needs to appreciate fully. There were certain things missing which we in the North of England assumed would be in place in a gallery in London but I don’t want to be too disparaging and critical. There were things we didn’t do and have learnt to do for next time. It is always a learning experience and this was just the start. So we need to plan where next; how to get more exhibitions, more coverage, more work ready to show.
I was going to write a little about reuniting in relation to the fact that we had been apart and come back together. My point being that recently I have had a few interesting conversations with woman who have husbands who work away for chunks of time and are then at home for longer periods, others who work away during the week and then return at the weekend. Some couples rarely have a night apart. Also, with children in the mix it is hard to have time just to be a couple sometimes and it is good to take time to ‘reunite’ and review together where you are at and where you are going. We have said it was such a shame that I couldn’t have been with him. Hearing all about his trip has been wonderful and I can imagine having been there sharing the moment. However, I have been very happy at home with the boys. When I was younger I used to think you had to find someone to walk on the same path as you. Now older and married I have learnt the beauty of a relationship is that you can be like two birds flying over different planes and pastures and reunite and share the different views you have experienced.
In very real-time my husband is currently polishing his sculptures in situ at the Brick Lane Gallery ready for the opening tomorrow evening. He travelled down yesterday with a man and a van and his sculptures. He has also just been to look at the bronze age foundry where he has a piece being cast at the moment. He is on the phone to me now as I write! Walking back from there now to the gallery. So it is all happening just now. I am holding the fort at home! The facility to write and then it immediately be published is amazing. My husband is able to find his way around because of modern technology (other wise he would be lost – map reading not one of his talents!)
Five years ago today we were in a mix state of emotion, getting married. I say that because it is a happy euphoric day but you approach it with trepidation some how. How time rushes by. All the events and changes that have happened in between. Last week was tense, I have never seen anyone so nervous about something which ultimately they no longer have control of, perhaps that’s part of the problem. Things that are out of our control make us worry. However, there is the thought of being interviewed or asked questions and in his second language and having time out of running the business so there is a lot going on. Logistically getting the sculptures down to London and back again is a mission and perhaps next time we will have to think of having a run of exhibitions that they can be showcased at a number of places to make the travel time more purposeful.
These images are of a piece I have already put up but they display a different angle and it is one of the sculptures in the exhibition. Actually these images are better in some ways, more interesting angles. We are complex beings aren’t we? Why do we get nervous, apprehensive?
Interestingly, Trepidation is also a term used in astronomy for “oscillation in the precession of the equinoxes” (the earth’s axis of rotation). Oscillation is the repetitive variation, typically in time, of some measure about a central value (often a point of equilibrium) or between two or more different states. We know about the swinging pendulum and AC power. Oscillations occur not only in physical systems but also in biological systems and in human society. Therefore, we oscillate between the state of anxiousness to excitement. Here to the excitement of the opening of the exhibition and the years ahead of us of happy marriage.
Dedicated to mother’s of the world. Happy Mother’s Day. Although we all know it’s mother’s day every day! We are raising future generations, we are nourishing future thinkers, we are nurturing future families, we are caring for future days. “Paradise lies under the feet of your mother”.
‘Being prepared’ has a kind of military connotation about it. For somethings it is important to be prepared, perhaps for most things. Those in school preparing for upcoming exams, at work with presentations, spiritual preparation, child-birth, moving house, getting married in sport physical and mental preparation is so important. It was the Oxford v Cambridge boat race at the weekend which always makes me hanker over my rowing days. The preparation was immense. I think it has so far been the only time when I have really prepared for anything. So where am i going with this?
My husband is in ‘preparation’ for his exhibition in London April 13th – 25th. He is busy getting sculptures finished but also I feel he is ‘mentally’ preparing, actually it is effecting his whole mood! There is also the logistics of getting the pieces down there and in situ.
The images here are of a past exhibition and a section of a piece that will be in the new exhibition. It is amazing how the position, lighting and surrounding space of an exhibition all makes a difference. Also, the advertising and publicity of bringing people together to see the works; the preparation! So what ever you are working towards at the moment think about your preparation. “I will prepare and someday my chance will come.”
— Abraham Lincoln (Chance or Fate!? see previous post)
Change, does us good. Moving around the furniture, getting rid of things we don’t need. I don’t always like it, we are such a disposable society, easily throwing things away that some one else could happily make use. Everything has it’s life span, I guess.We can be nostalgic but we don’t always need to hold on to everything to make us remember. We’ve been having a spring clean and it’s good for the house and soul!
The images below of the thinker is an older piece and we no longer have. It was a realisation of an idea, a physical sketchbook piece if you like. As he moves through life different materials and sources become available, by natural change and chance!
Do you believe it Fate? That life is meant to be? Or does life happen by chance!?
My husband’s life has been mapped out with twists and turns so dramatic that his life is almost a visual picture of fate – ‘maktub’. A few big things are coming up one of which is an exhibition in London, which I will write more about soon. I have finally finished the Artist Statement you can take a look, as it is now up on the blog on its own page. Hopefully this will be a chance for people to physically view his new work.
THE SCULPTOR'S WIFE 
