An extract from Bourgeois; A view from the bottom of the well
In 1875-6 Rodin, made his first major work, The Age Of Bronze (spring's awakening), which signalled a new beginning in art that no longer depended upon the primacy of subject matter, or narration, or mimesis. This visual experience derives from a concept in art that is no longer, “…beholden to specific anecdotal representation: a concept of art that has freed itself and is thus no longer clutching at the centuries old Aristotelian principle of mimesis, of imitating nature as truthfully and faithfully as possible.” 7. (Crone and Schaesberg in Louise Bourgeois The Secrets of the Cells). He was entrusting it entirely to the genuinely artistic realms of free creative imagination. The developed concept of the fragment in Rodin's work allows us to conjure up disjointed narratives and complete them with meaningful allusions. Confronted with a fragment such as Rodin's La Pensee of the mid 1880's the viewer is challenged to make his own independent, intuitive contribution to the dialogue with the artwork. Crone describes this process by which the viewer “…is inspired to abandon value judgements and to sound out for himself the possible ideas and multiplicities of meaning in a given work”(Crone et al) 8. Free of the detail of figurative sculpture, the fragment, by virtue of its succinctness gives a voice to something greater than itself. Such fragmentary sculptures as Meditation Sans Bras (The Inner Voice) and Torso provide insights into the energies and strengths that direct and determine human behaviour vis-à-vis the human being.
Thread or yarn is an ancient metaphor for the pattern of our lives, “…the thin,breakable thread in the child’s room reveals the unfinished process of creative construction, a loosely-structured world of possibilities” (Crone, et, al) 22. The fragility vulnerability of thread with its perpetual threat of breaking, snagging, knotting, distracted and enmeshed in a tangled web can also contain possibility of a freeing positive flowing of the thread
2000
WHITE RABBIT
A tree broken at right angles like gallows in the forest
Trunks sprayed greens like painters’ painting trees growing lengthways along stream
Long fallen grown over growing greens foxhole opposite riverbank fresh earth
Young trees almost prostrate giving thanks to the earth that bears them
Boughs branches snaking through inclines the stream hasn’t left me today
We climb up over the black and white eyes sitting smoking and up the closed concrete hedges both sides and into town
Across the stream and the glade a giant white rabbit sitting profile ears erect in a field
I will always love you, he told me the last time I saw him
Face fell when I said; I will come and see you in the spring
The sheep bleating no lambs yet too cold to come
And I still hear the stream continue the climb up through the dark
Silver tape to lead the way abandoned young tree hacked by sculptor standing bored
Beak open to capacity baby bird crying for food tree hip
Keep your clothes on; I don’t want to see the underside of your tree
Roots mouldy and mud-grey boulders stuck and lifted when fell
Root grown round stones cut clean from soil as if with a blade
Green in the distance supported by neighbours thatched roof orange pines fine shelter
Early February first honeysuckle leaves interlaced barbed wire
Orange crumbling heads hiding in hollow belly-grotto dies
Siamese trees locked at heart hips and genitals still growing solar plexus ravaged
Yellow ribbons round trees ate some of the horses bread today I was so hungry
Like it best when I don’t meet anyone at all
Mind eased I haven’t thought of you for the past hour and now you return to me
Father had his education stolen mother her childhood stolen
Opportunity stolen what might I have been
Sitting with monsters buzzing couldn’t see them in the thicket but they are there
It’s time to go home
Maybe call me, when you want to, rather than when you think you should
Since I closed the door you enter my dreams easily goodbye to the white rabbit
I may have sent you red roses and declarations Valentines flower is the crocus
I have happy yellow ones in the garden planning to be dazzled
2006
LOVE
Rain sodden blackberries leaves hanging like dead crinkled bats
The wind heavy spots spiny prickles guarding fruit laden brambles
Suddenly sun black blue throbbing reds glistening
Bushes heavy dark down there relieved to have pulled out first impression lessons
Over-reach stung
Fat beefy crinkled undersides holed bitten multilayered fragile fronged brown stained leaved fingers large as steaks
Forever promise won’t poison you/ eat/ to kill you would be painful
Today eat black mists idyllic islands tree tipped with the heat/ flush
Different field different breed nippled longer limbed stretching above green
And the little ones shiny knobbled pin head family
Fields of families’ acid yellow orange rust lips curled dancers
Come to the fence/ move away/ over the fields drizzle open shirt
Here breathing heavier comes
Split crocodile fight tendoned mossy jaws bird angled neck fallen meets the earth butterfly buttercup fly crawlie pissed wet arse
My life is my life/ your life is your life/ 2 busy foraging to worry if you’ll call
Nettle mushroom garlic soup blackberry crumble/ why would I remember you
Juice stained sheets stunted stunted upturned trunks
Sapling sprung sniffing whiskers haired groaning necks
Continue through mud and shit august foxgloves dead crusted pods
Orchids rampant smother stream purple broccoli
Over there/ they watch/ horses/ here boned arched back sea-blue eyes long lashed brown white/ white brown curious cautious
Alive wet unprotected searching munching continue
Brave return kicks belly bitten challenge expectations of adulthood
Lavender parachutes languid penises purple seeded sways
Bright sunshine tiniest fly feeding red stalked stars grand safe consistent
2010
SUNLIGHT JANUARY
Fresh whites gone churned up sunlight January wakening autumn stored
Face truthfulness cob house NYC gallery
Red hooveshoes
Sunshine brings them all out the dog walkers rat boys walking through toxicity
People scared to say hello
Mind numb anaesthetic face fingertips frozen sheep still running away
Great pylon emerging from black thicket wise ruler outreaching flock
Pastel baby blues low clouds
Smell chill ice rustle still
Bright stark skeletons alveoli against green white blue long shadows grazing horizon
To be out and alone running the fields
Tractor tracks furrows leaves companions
Not a trace of it
Fresh start new beginnings
And the tree is dead
Continue through damp rotting floor
NAME carved into trunk mossy stains brown crinkles decision reached
Ravenous remains dragged preserved ice eaten thaw no bones only fur
Bones January crunched white expansive execution long dead feast
Heron pterodactyl timelessness running again warming up
Buttercup four flowers
Glistening rushing bubbling momentary change missed opportunity
Hedgehog flows over obstacles pile-up and the flowing keeps
Water white hitting air miniature lagoons sunshine silvery waterfalls mighty Nile
Frothy omelettes rushing silence rushing water
Squished wilted ferns death over-ride greens remains icy preservation hairy rods legs bent at knees new growth through decomposition
Snow came early autumn out-of-sync
Banked rusted oranges less protection pinked red stalks silver larch
Bony arms outreaching overcast running home almost before
All the logs gone fires homes wet shadow remains
Bike track vertebrae
Bright viridian greens against grey undergrowth
Mossy fluffy beards on branches
Holly no berries
2011
WAR
“Can you tighten my bolts?”
Paintbrush palette representation and rape
We started with breasts and now the asymmetrical brow is up for refashioning
Powerful in control and exercising will in a race to look younger and other
Boys with their toys development capture and control
Body engineering barbie bountiful modifying plasticized models
“Hack where you like, I don’t mind, I want you to do what you think will suit me best” said the woman to the plastic surgeon
Gas and the scalpel invading assaulting with permission and thanks
Put me to sleep have sex with me while I’m unconscious if you want
Rape me and bugger my children but please make me pretty
Come and experiment on me doctor frankenstein mister mechanic knock up my bumps
No shortage of supplies in the horror of living with the self
Orange faced over plucked stylists hold to ransom “You’re a lady now!”
Premenstrual tension kicked into touch we have a bigger contender
Women in all their gory pay to reinvent me given a seeing to begging for it
Children learn that a woman has no self until the superficial is perfected
“I beseech you good doctor I’m ashamed please change me”
Endoscopic brow lifting bolts carpet grippers dissolving within
Normal noses broken with hammers adam’s rib has collar stiffeners to support plastic rhinoceros; asymmetry rocks
“We all work together” said the surgeon to the woman after a major massacre
You can see where I’ve been few traces of evidence but I did wear gloves and wash my hands you weren’t drunk and said “yes”
Abdominoplasty for the gluttons eat all that avoids the self then cut and suck
Settles down to seed after catching big fish frowns come when smiling stops
“I’m worried about the scars doctor and the loose screws”
2005