Meeting Ekphrasis

Ekphrasis is a genre of writing about a work of art. Homer’s lengthy and vivid description of Achilles' shield in The Iliad is one of the oldest examples, though Keat’s Ode to a Grecian Urn is more quoted, especially its enigmatic last lines.

Beauty is truth, truth beauty,—that is all
          Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.

The writer, and most often a poet, explores a work of art, responds to it, even adds elements from his or her own life. The Poetry Foundation defines an ekphrastic poem as follows: “Through the imaginative act of narrating and reflecting on the ‘action’ of a painting or sculpture, the poet may amplify and expand its meaning.” I love this description and thought about it when I sat down to write a statement about a new sculpture I am exhibiting at 6 Bridges Gallery in Maynard, Massachusetts (July 11 – August 12).

Meeting in the studio. sculpture, 2017

To write about, Meeting, I started by considering its materials — rope and wood. Rope is used to connect one object to another, a canoe to a tree or a skiff to a dock. A rope hammock connects two trees. What intrigued me when I placed the thick rope into the walnut trunk was that it connected back to itself. There was no connecting of two objects but a unifying of the whole. The ends disappeared as if there were no ends.

This section of a tug-of-war-size rope has been in my studio for six years ago. Back then, I suspended it, tied it, uncoiled part of it, and wove it back into itself. When I hung up the heavy coil, it made me think of a Japanese Enso, the circle that is an expression of enlightenment, the ultimate connection with everything because there is nothing inside or outside, nothing separate or divided, nothing to connect, no beginning and no ending.

I then wrapped a thin white twine around the rope, the way a snake coils around a stick. It reminded me of a painting I saw in a small church in Florence. Christ was nailed to the cross alone up on Calvary Hill. There was a simple white cloth wrapped around his pelvis, the cloth painted as if being blown by a gentle breeze. The body was dead, but life stirred in the simplicity of the white threads. The painter may have been suggesting that life is never completely extinguished.

The wood component of the sculpture, a walnut trunk, sawn twice to reveal its two hollow sections, has also been in my studio for a number of years. A bronze sculpture I made of Kwan Yin, the Goddess of Compassion, sat on it for a while, but I removed her knowing the wood had something else to reveal.

One day I took the tug-of-war rope and threaded it through and around the wood. I was intrigued by what I saw, but also by what I didn’t see. In Meeting, we don’t actually see whether the two ends of the rope meet. It’s a question that is unanswered. The rope, in its serpentine path around and into the trunk reveals only part of itself. It is like happening upon a snake, though the head and tail are hidden.

Meeting is the word for the worship practice of the Quakers. I went to a Quaker elementary school where we had ‘meeting for worship’ on Wednesday mornings. We sat in silence unless someone was moved to speak. In a Quaker Meeting, we meet ourselves, we meet God, we meet each other.

Art is a form of meeting. We meet the work, its materials, colors, and forms, the artist and ourselves. Ekphrasis writing is a form of meeting. When I write about my own work, I discover connections that I had never considered while making the piece. And when I read the writing of others who have been inspired my art, I encounter the work differently.

At another summer exhibit where I have a sculpture, Art on the Trails: Finding Solace in the Woods at the Beal Preserve in Southborough, MA (June 7 – September 24), there will be a reading of ekphrastic poems written about the works of the exhibiting artists. I have a new casting of Tree Harp in the exhibit and hope there will be a poem written about it. I much prefer to hear what others write about my sculpture. An ekphrastic poem that I treasure was written by Joanne Reynolds about my sculpture Ordinary Pine when it was installed at the Jackson Homestead in Newton, Massachusetts.

Ordinary Pine, partial view, installed at Jackson Homestead, Newton, MA

       Ordinary Pine         

What happened? That is to say, what happened
To us? Or between us? What
Will become of us now?

True, you were older. Suffered
The deluge. Cast a shadow
More borrowed than your own.

I came shortly after. Not so much a part
As a go-between - a link.

I remember the way you reached out
To the youngest - your great hands - how well they played!

Facing away from you now, each of us
Cut down, I long to see you.
Both of you.

Such a hole in each of us.

                        —Joanne Reynolds

Guardians of the Swamp

When I feel depleted by the chaos in the world, or just my own weariness, I know I need to connect with the work of other artists, writers, and thinkers. I see their art as meridians that connect the darkness of my own psyche with an outward vision of something mysterious, fresh, and true. Anne Eder is an interdisciplinary artist who does just that. Anne created two mythological forest creatures, Qwkglaks, for Old Frog Pond Farm's annual harvest sculpture exhibit last fall. They speak to us directly of the mystery of rain, moss, forest, and deep ecology.

Anne Eder with her newly installed, Qwkglak, the 'King'.

They sit, one poised, like a King on a rotting trunk, the other under the canopy of an upturned root system. The latter, more difficult to find, sits a little way off the main trail, but once spotted, can leave no doubt that some kind of primordial wisdom is being expressed. A young girl with her parents, so taken with this one, stepped off the trail into the bog, her boots sinking, staying behind in the mud as she trod over to it in bare feet. Her parents shyly asked when they returned to the house if they could use the outdoor hose to clean her up before they got into their car. Children are connected to their instincts and are closer to this source of origin.

Baudelaire wrote: “Genius is nothing more nor less than childhood recovered at will.” I consider Anne such a genius. When I look at these magical creatures, they are familiar, and I am enamored, appreciative, of their existence. I smile. I feel better just seeing them. I imagine that Anne’s sculptures get up and move when no one is around. They slink around the woods, crossing the swamp and muttering magical incantations among the trees. Not disturbing a growing plant or settled stone, they step lightly and carefully. Around the King’s log, the skunk cabbage is now in its fullest expression with bright green elephant ears, yet not one leaf has been trampled.

Even if you don’t believe in my magical thinking, we all believe in transformation. How else to understand the pointy purplish claws of the skunk cabbage poking through the ground a few months ago becoming a sprawling thick carpet of green waves? Or a bare tree, suddenly sending green shoots from within dry, seemingly solid bark? Nature continuously transforms itself. Spring leaves, so light-filled, are photosynthesizing like mad to flood the tree with sugars. I look at Anne’s creatures and feel that a similar process is happening: she has orchestrated the coming together of forest materials to become wild creatures who nourish us — ageless creations, a union of art and nature, both healing and uncannily witty.

Anne documented the changes of the creatures over the fall and winter. They dozed under deep snow and woke as the first skunk cabbage poked up. The King lost his scepter and his nose! However, last week, Anne came back and restored the royal Qwkglak with fresh moss and flowers, and a new scepter, a giant, unfurled fern.

The other ‘Guardian’, she decided to leave to decompose further, to return to the forest from whence it came. Only the ceramic pieces, a few rib bones, and nails will not decay. In the fall, Anne will return again to enhance the King. She will be leaving artifacts for visitors to pay homage to this creature, and even to create a retinue of creatures of their own. We’re honored to have Anne Eider’s work at the farm where we aspire to encourage creativity at the confluence of Agriculture, Art, and Community. Healthy food feeds the body, nature and art feed the spirit, and in sharing both, we support each other. Take a look at Anne Eder's website and mark Sunday, September 10 for the opening day of our annual outdoor sculpture exhibition.

A Man with a Mission: The Nuts and Bolts of Bronze Casting

Zach Gabbard, the owner and founder of Mission Foundry, is a man of many talents. He works the wax room, mold making, metal finishing, and casting. In the photo above, on the slab of yellow foam behind Zach, some small wax figures await preparation for casting. This preparation includes adding a wax funnel to the sculpture, as well as any additional wax supports, called sprues or gates, to help with the flow of bronze to all parts of the sculpture. I don’t have a photo of a wax sculpture with sprues but below are two seahorses with their funnel and sprues in bronze. (It made such an interesting object I kept it as cast).

Bronze Seahorses with funnel and sprues on my desk.

The prepared wax sculpture is then dipped in a slurry, floured with dry silica powder, and hung to dry. In the two photos below, Zach is building up the mold on an architectural element that he will cast into bronze. The funnel is attached to the top of this cornice piece.

Dipping the wax to build up the ceramic mold.

Flouring the dipped mold.

This process builds up a hard ceramic shell over the wax. It takes about a week to create a 3/8-inch shell in a series of nine dippings with drying time. The ceramic mold is fired at a low temperature to melt out the wax; then it is fired at 1500 degrees for about an hour to fuse the mold. Any residue from the wax vaporizes, the mold vitrifies (heats to a glass-like state), and glows a fiery red.

This is the moment to pour the melted bronze that has been heated in a furnace to about 2100 degrees into the mold. Once the bronze cools, the cast sculpture is ready to be removed from its hard ceramic shell. The only way to get the sculpture out is to completely break the shell, hammering first, and then picking out any ceramic pieces that remain. The last small particles of the shell are removed by sandblasting the bronze.

The metal working bench at Mission Foundry.

Metal finishing is next. The bronze sculpture still has the funnel with sprues attached. These have to be cut off, and the surface worked, so there is no sign of the supports. Think of freeing the bronzes seahorses from their poised equilibrium.

When a sculpture is cast in several parts like the Chalice I made for the Unitarian Universalist Church in Harvard, the pieces must be welded together. 

The two circular tree branches will be welded to the sculpture to form the two circles surrounding the chalice flame.

The sculpture is now ready for a final sandblasting before its patina. The patina is the treatment on the surface, and the colors can range from black to green to a polished gold. The sculpture is heated with a blow torch, and a chemical or a combination of chemicals are brushed onto it. The reaction of the bronze with the heated chemicals oxidizes the surface and forms the patina. A coat of wax is added to protect it.

Now we have a finished sculpture, but no mold. That’s the rub. This process is called ‘Lost Wax.’ The sculpture is one-of-a-kind; and I cannot make another copy. If I had wanted to make an edition, that is several copies of the same piece, my original wax would have been used to make a rubber mold with a hard ceramic exterior encasing the rubber and giving it solidity. This rubber mold could then be used to make additional wax models of my sculpture. The process would then go to step one again – the wax preparation with a funnel and spruing, and dipping and flouring, to build up the hard shell for the bronze pouring. Every casting needs one wax model and a ceramic mold built up around it that will be destroyed in the process. To make several copies, you need to have a mold made from the original so you can make several wax copies.

For my small bronze figures, I go straight to casting from the wax without making a rubber mold. These pieces are cast solid and are one-of-a-kind. For larger pieces, the weight of the piece and the amount of bronze needed makes this direct casting impossible. By making a rubber mold, a wax positive of the sculpture can be created so that when the bronze is poured the final sculpture will be hollow. However, each wax copy made from the rubber mold needs to be retouched. A hand or seahorse tail might be distorted in the unmolding and either the artist or the foundry will need to touch up the wax. No two sculptures are ever exactly the same.

Zach is now casting Tree Harp for me. This sculpture has a two-part rubber mold; the wax parts will be cast separately and then put together. When I go to the foundry to see the completed wax, I will sign this one 3/6.  This signifies that there will be 6 castings allowed and that this is the first. Once all the castings are produced, the rubber mold will be destroyed to prevent more copies of the sculpture. After Tree Harp is cast, I’ll apply the gold leaf in my studio and it will be ready to live permanently outdoors.

Tree Harp 1/6 at Old Frog Pond Farm.  Photo:Robert Hesse

A great amount of work takes place in a foundry – the artisans working there are artists. At a large foundry, there will be workers who make molds and others who work only in wax. Many of them are sculptors, supporting themselves with a foundry job. Zach is just starting his foundry and does everything but the casting alone.  I am so appreciative of his talents. When you enter the foundry door, there is a large sculpture — a wild vision of crazy sunflowers. It’s Zach’s work. I’ve already asked him to bring it to the farm for our outdoor sculpture exhibit this fall.

A Chalice of Spirit, Art, and Nature

Six months ago, I was asked by a small committee if I would make a chalice for the First Congregational Unitarian Church of Harvard. They would soon be welcoming a new minister, and it was to be a symbol of this new beginning. A chalice – hmm, I had no idea. At the Last Supper, Jesus drank from a wine-filled cup, and it became the much sought after Holy Grail, but I didn’t have a personal relationship with this Christian object of worship.

The committee explained that their chalice commission was not actually a cup, but a flaming chalice, the official symbol of the Unitarian Universalist (UU) Association. It represents two important liturgical symbols—the chalice and the flame—and they are united by two circles.

The Unitarian Universalist website says, “We are a house without walls, a congregation without spiritual boundaries.” This symbol, likewise, seems to hold no one meaning or interpretation, but to represent the broadest possible teachings of significant importance in the Unitarian Church—generosity, love, justice, compassion, as well as service and sacrifice for others.

Light, flames, candles, and sacred fires cross religious boundaries. In my childhood synagogue, there was an ornate lamp hanging in front of the ark where the Torah was stored. It hung by three golden chains from the high domed ceiling. I often wondered if it was really an eternal lamp, and considered, while I sat through a long service, the logistics of filling it with oil and lighting it.

Light is easy to identify with, but I wasn’t asked to make the light but the chalice to support it. Then I remembered the story of Siddhartha before he became the Buddha. For six years after leaving his home, Siddhartha followed many teachers and excelled at the most austere practices. At one point, so emaciated that he was close to death, he realized that he was not getting closer to what he was seeking. That’s when he recalled sitting under an apple tree as a child while the adults were plowing the fields; he remembered his calm state of mind. He resolved to take nourishment, find this calm mind again, and sit under a tree until he reached enlightenment.

I’m an orchardist in a town well-known for its beautiful orchards. Our fruit trees offer us sustenance and beauty. Trees also offer refuge. I think we can all remember sitting against the trunk of a tree; it’s so simple, and universal. Inspired by my own love for trees and the Buddha’s story, I decided to use the image of a tree for Harvard’s Unitarian Church’s chalice. I made the trunk to support the chalice bowl and sculpted two small seated figures leaning against its trunk, enjoying the peacefulness, exemplifying a calm abiding, an equanimity. Above the figures, for the two circles, I used tree branches. The branches will encircle a glass sphere oil lamp (not pictured).

I made the sculpture in wax and had it cast into bronze. (I will write about bronze casting in another blog.) This Sunday it will be lit for the first time. The service begins at 10:00 am, 9 Ayer Road in the center of Harvard. All are welcome!

First Congregational Unitarian Church of Harvard Chalice