PROMETHEUS-VERSION #1
This piece is the first in a series of ‘mobile’ sculptures, whose theme, intially, was the ‘idea’ of the garden – what it represents or might represent. I called it ‘In my garden there is a flowerbed where Prometheus sleeps’ - for short, 'Prometheus'. It is about regeneration and renewal: gardening being probably one of the most obvious examples of which the majority of people, in this culture, are aware or become involved - a vestige of our agrarian roots.
The motivation came originally with an invitation, from an artist in Cornwall, Bernard Irwin, to collaborate on a piece for the ‘Exchange’ in Penzance – he and his partner, Claire, have been sculpting several acres of land for at least a decade. As his garden features hugely in his paintings and drawings, it seemed a good place for me to focus as well. Though it was not the theme from which our collaboration eventually emerged , it was, however, one of a number of approaches I had wanted to explore.
Here, my initial thought was to make a mobile stage, 183cm square (6 x 6 ft), raised upon castors, with its own lighting fixed to a plank, suspended above and supported by vertical timbers. Across the back was to be a bent aluminium tube, shaped and attached like the ‘handle’ on a supermarket trolley – allowing the stage to be steered into different spaces, settings, environments: a stage within a stage? A play within a play?
It was intended that the first incarnation, a ‘bed’, would be placed on this stage, covered in artificial flowers: the head and footboards curved at the top like tombstones. On the bed itself was to be laid the shrouded figure of Prometheus. Perched on the plank above the light (a fluorescent strip ‘filtered’ through wire wool) would be two birds of prey. The idea of ’flowerbed’ as regenerative becomes a place to plant, to sleep, a grave – cycles of life. However, intuition and the accidents of wandering unexpected paths led, as you can see, to a somewhat different outcome in ‘Version #1’. The recent death of my father-in-law, a writer and our last parent, had had its influences, and my materials and the environment, theirs.
I designated the ‘sleeper’ as Prometheus, because he took fire (knowledge) from the Greek gods and gave it to Man. For this they chained him to a mountain, where each day a bird of prey pecked out his liver, and each day it grew back again – another tale of regeneration. Coincidently, this mountain, now in Georgia, the one south of Russia, is also where wine making reputedly began. Reflecting over a glass of supermarket plonk, I wondered whether, at the time, they understood the connection between alcohol and liver damage?!
This piece is the first in a series of ‘mobile’ sculptures, whose theme, intially, was the ‘idea’ of the garden – what it represents or might represent. I called it ‘In my garden there is a flowerbed where Prometheus sleeps’ - for short, 'Prometheus'. It is about regeneration and renewal: gardening being probably one of the most obvious examples of which the majority of people, in this culture, are aware or become involved - a vestige of our agrarian roots.
The motivation came originally with an invitation, from an artist in Cornwall, Bernard Irwin, to collaborate on a piece for the ‘Exchange’ in Penzance – he and his partner, Claire, have been sculpting several acres of land for at least a decade. As his garden features hugely in his paintings and drawings, it seemed a good place for me to focus as well. Though it was not the theme from which our collaboration eventually emerged , it was, however, one of a number of approaches I had wanted to explore.
Here, my initial thought was to make a mobile stage, 183cm square (6 x 6 ft), raised upon castors, with its own lighting fixed to a plank, suspended above and supported by vertical timbers. Across the back was to be a bent aluminium tube, shaped and attached like the ‘handle’ on a supermarket trolley – allowing the stage to be steered into different spaces, settings, environments: a stage within a stage? A play within a play?
It was intended that the first incarnation, a ‘bed’, would be placed on this stage, covered in artificial flowers: the head and footboards curved at the top like tombstones. On the bed itself was to be laid the shrouded figure of Prometheus. Perched on the plank above the light (a fluorescent strip ‘filtered’ through wire wool) would be two birds of prey. The idea of ’flowerbed’ as regenerative becomes a place to plant, to sleep, a grave – cycles of life. However, intuition and the accidents of wandering unexpected paths led, as you can see, to a somewhat different outcome in ‘Version #1’. The recent death of my father-in-law, a writer and our last parent, had had its influences, and my materials and the environment, theirs.
I designated the ‘sleeper’ as Prometheus, because he took fire (knowledge) from the Greek gods and gave it to Man. For this they chained him to a mountain, where each day a bird of prey pecked out his liver, and each day it grew back again – another tale of regeneration. Coincidently, this mountain, now in Georgia, the one south of Russia, is also where wine making reputedly began. Reflecting over a glass of supermarket plonk, I wondered whether, at the time, they understood the connection between alcohol and liver damage?!