Spring’s hands are tied
#50 (18in/46cm)
A woman, half horse, half desire. Whether we like it or not, we are part of the animal race. When desire inexorably rises in us, painful and earnest, we often feel great tension. In cold countries, spring is felt almost at a physical level. IThas arrived, palpable down to our veins. This piece was made in the springtime.
Anecdote
Often, I don’t immediately understand the sculptures I am working on.
While working on Spring, I didn’t really know what I was creating. I had made the legs and body of the sculpture and I liked their vigour, but I had no idea where I was going with it. So one night, after a day’s work, I went to bed determined to destroy my clay the next day.
At that time, I lived on a mountainside in a three-storey house. We had a mixed malamute-husky, Sherpa. One night, Sherpa started barking very loudly. From the third floor where I slept, I came down to see what was bothering her. Behind the house was a retaining wall about eighty feet long, holding back the mountain. At the foot of the wall, a frightened porcupine was running back and forth. Having learned from experience, Sherpa merely barked at it. In a panic, the terrified porcupine would run three feet in one direction, and not finding the end of the wall, turn around and run three feet the other way.
I brought Sherpa into the house and went back upstairs to bed. After a few minutes’ sleep, I felt Sherpa’s warm breath on my face. In ten years, our big, lazy dog had never come up to the third floor! I went back down to let the dog out, pretty sure that the intruding porcupine had left. But there it was, still a prisoner of the retaining wall, and still stubbornly running back and forth!
I believe in signs.
Why was life waking me up twice to see this animal running to and fro? What was I supposed to understand? I stopped and considered. Had the porcupine kept on running in either direction, it would have found his way.
I finally understood: this was my unfinished sculpture. I had to go to the end and see what was there.
The next day, to the pawing body of the sculpture I added a neck and head that resembled the mane of a horse desperately trying to break loose. It seemed obvious that I should cross the arms behind the body. The energy emanating from this piece seemed so lively and irritating that it could not be contained, so I tied the wrists. Then it seemed natural that the upraised leg should be wearing a rolled-down sock.
When I was finished, I sat back and tried to understand.
