Column, earth, wood, 1997
Sculpture from degree / thesis show at Loughborough College of Art, 1997. This piece was made using a plywood mold in 2 sections. prior to dumping any of the dirt inside i insert the "space frame" a sol le wit ish construction. this exo skeleton was intended to help keep the piece together. however when it came time to deinstall the sculpture withstood several blows from a pick axe to even put a dent in it. in the end i had to push it over. which given that i thought in was going to fall over is pretty cool.
this general idea with this piece was to create something that was life size, by which i mean to scale with with me the artist. i was influenced by david smith at the time and his idea of a piece that one could see over, …. just…. on tip toes. the rest of the installation had a piece the was much taller than a person (the pyramid) and one that in longer than a person but on the floor and one that we can step over easily.
of the whole installation this piece became the most "representational" in the sense that it immediately resembled a core sample taken from the earth. the part about the piece i found most fascinating was how the sections of earth transcribed my moods. for instance there was a period when i was working when i was feeling very discombobulated later on i could point out that specific section so in that sense the column recorded a moment in time.
