Sculpture, 1999

MFA exhibition Anna Leonowens Gallery, Halifax, NS, Canada

Shield and Shadow:

White Shield: Italian marble, steel stand; 41" x 51" x 10" (105 x 130 x 25 cm)

Shadow: hydrocal plaster over wire, iron oxide pigment; 193 x 43 x 35 cm

White Shadows: 2 elements, Italian marble; stone 1: 42.5" x 16" x 22.4" (108 x 41 x 57 cm); stone 2: 41" x 20" x 16"(104 x 51 x 41 cm)

The Shields for a Human: 2 elements, hydrocal plaster over wire, graphite, iron oxide pigment; element 1: 94” x 39” x 9” (240 x 100 x 23 cm); element 2: 86” x 39” x 15” (220 x 100 x 38 cm)

White Shield and Shadow, 1998-1999, plays with the echo of the corporeal in reflection to the natural. The White Shield is exhibited in connection to a second piece that is bound to the floor. This second element is an amorphous form and has roughly the size of a person (180cm x 50xm in diam.) It is round and relatively flat on the bottom. Both ends converge to a round tip. The form does not reveal its nature through a readable image. It works with a "likeness". The form is worked in plaster over wire and then layered with iron oxide and graphite so that it has a dark, almost black, earthy colour. The surface is tight, yet heavily marked and rough.

In Shield and Shadow, the shadow takes on an individual form. It manifests an identity that relates to the viewer's body before it makes sense as a shadow cast by the shield. The piece shifts between the two poles of culture and nature that form a basic element of most of my work. Both elements together in a gallery situation emphasize the importance of culture in reference to nature as a source and the dynamic that is inherent in this conflict. All my works point to the fact that the understanding of nature is a cultural thing. They draw on a positive engagement with form as well as oneself as cultural being.

White Shadows, 1999, is the second piece in the gallery. It consists of two forms that are carved from white Italian marble. The surface is heavily marked, leaving patterns of tool marks on a richly veined surface. The pieces are amorphous forms that seem to relate to animal shapes like birds or fish, but could as well stand for other evaluations. They leave the viewer in doubt of what they are, but more so, of where they belong to. They rest on the gallery floor in such a way, that one is certain that they do not belong there. They seem to come from somewhere and will go somewhere else. Even though they have a powerful density and weight, they are not stable or firm. They appear to be moveable and balance in a moment of rest. The duality of the nature of a shadow (as I described it earlier for the piece five shadows) is manifested in white stone.

The piece is installed in close proximity to the third piece in the exhibition - "shields for a human" and I like them very much in relation to each other. Together the two pieces seem to complement "shield and shadow" in their understanding of a subjective sensibility.

The Shields for a Human, 1999, are fairly large pieces in relation to the human body and are made out of plaster over wire. They are covered with iron oxide and graphite and have a dark, roughly marked surface. They are flat like shields, and their shape references reduced forms - as if they were made to cover a specific form.

Yet, their very presence makes them "things" that deny any such function. About 2.30m long and more than a meter wide, they would easily allow a person to find shelter. As a thing - they do not invite you to move them in order to find enough space and room underneath or behind them. They refuse any defined reading of what they are made out of and how heavy they really are. Just like the "white shadows", they do not appear stable or rooted. Despite their size they seem to be taken away from somewhere and do not belong here.

The forms draw attention to the moment of experience, the moment of an encounter that is contextualized in an individual reading. The encounter takes place between us as cultural beings - and these things as form.