Clay sculpting and sketches Jan 09

'On Growing Up' - #1/3

Have been doing a fair bit of sketching of late

Today however decided to try my hand at clay sculpting with quite interesting results...

The clay was far softer than I thought it was going to be (having not really worked with it before I thought it would be quite leathery and firm but it was like sculpting with soft butter to a certain extent.)

I've done 4 peices -

The first titled 'knowledge' talks about how as human beings we are always learning, somtimes that learning comes at pivotal points or steps in our lives, other times it seems interwoven in the very fabric of our existence. There are 'ah - ha' moments, like stepping stones in our path, but always we strive higher, to learn more, to understand more, to be more enligtened (hence the arrow pointing upwards at the pinnacle of the peice)

The other three are a series that started out to be about 'greif' but as I had the urge to drive nails through the sides of them (3 in each representing childhood, youth and adulthood) the work became about 'growing up' and the pain there is in that process but how if we walk on above that pain to the next stage at the final stage of our life we truely begin to blossom, I've done three in differing heights and widths and wondering why this was I asked myself about it when they were completed and i realised it was about that not everyones life spans are the same, some people have a short life span (though no less valid or of worth) whereas others live longer and therefore have more lifeline and perhaps differing points of pain in their lives.

Inspite of pain, inspite of wounding, all of us have the potential within us to stand uprightly and blossom. It is our time to bloom and no longer to be hidden within ourselves or advised on how to be by the pain we went through at differing times in our lives.