Introduction
| Terra Firma - Terra Incognita "... to landsmen in general, the native inhabitants of the seas have ever been regarded with emotions unspeakably unsocial and repelling; though we know the sea to be an everlasting terra incognita, so that Columbus sailed over numberless unknown worlds to discover his one superficial western one; though, by vast odds, the most terrific of all mortal disasters have immemorially and indiscriminately befallen tens and hundreds of thousands of those who have gone upon the waters; though but a moment's consideration will teach, and that however baby man may brag of his science and skill, and however much, in a flattering future, that science and skill may augment; yet for ever and for ever, to the crack of doom , the sea will insult and murder him, and pulverize the stateliest frigate he can make; nevertheless, by the continual repetition of these very impressions, man has lost that sense of the full awfulness of the sea which aboriginally belongs to it. The first boat we read of, floated on an ocean, that with Portuguese vengeance had whelmed a whole world without leaving so much as a widow. That same ocean rolls now; that same ocean destroyed the wrecked ships of last year. Yea, foolish mortals, Noah's flood is not yet subsided; two thirds of the fair world it yet covers. Wherein differ the sea and the land........ ..Consider all this; and then turn to this green, gentle, and most docile earth; consider them both, the sea and the land; and do you not find a strange analogy to something in yourself? For as this appalling ocean surrounds the verdant land, so in the soul of man there lies one insular Tahiti, full of peace and joy, but encompassed by all the horrors of that half known life, God keep thee! Push not off from that isle, thou canst never return!" from Moby Dick by Herman Melville 1851 The land and the sea have figured in my work from the beginning, being brought up on the Wirral peninsular surrounded by the sea and two dramatic rivers, shipbuilding, sailing, docks and beautiful sandstone heathland. Water and earth were closely associated in my early imagination. My father was a merchant seaman before and during the war, he sailed to America, the Far East and on the Russian convoys. He built and sailed beautiful A-class model yachts coming second in the British Championships in 1962. We grew up literally surrounded by boats. They were often discussed - as people do, as if they were alive, had characters, histories. Now in my family the reality, memory and myth are deeply intertwined. References to landscapes and objects in landscapes, both real and imagined are a common thread in my work. Memory and temporal awareness are very important, the landscapes are psychological spaces filled with implied human presence. Different qualities of light, sound and objects equate with different emotions or thoughts. Submerged objects may evoke buried, distant or suppressed feelings or desires. Solid heavy objects imply presence, immortality, immutability. Elevated objects and movement suggest change or transformation even transcendence. Reflections, mirages, projected light and images infer ambiguity, veiled reality and complexity. For many years in installations I have been trying to explore a kind of sculptural "magic realism" where real sites, images of places, actual artefacts, models, toys, fake objects and false memories are mixed. Small pools of water are enough to evoke a vast ocean. The shadow of an object becomes a well-known constellation that in turn represents the heavens. Materials and scale are played with - a paper boat is really a stone boat, a hanging wooden object is actually made of stone, an actual plough share is placed in a tiny 'field' of soil; an anchor submerged in a small water tank. When we walk through a landscape what we see is filtered through our thoughts and emotions, we never simply see 'what is there'; it becomes a complex collage distorted by memory, history and knowledge. Movement, travel and journeys are implied in the installations and sculpture. Representation and represented are intimately connected; maps, surveying and navigation are always present. The map often constructs and informs the territory. I discovered the Marlborough Downs through the work of Paul Nash, consequently I find it hard to separate my direct awareness of the Marlborough Downs from Paul Nash's paintings and photographs - I am uncertain whether I am experiencing the reality or Nash's construction of it. The installations construct an imagined space with a complex mix of objects, light, sound, movement, reflection and illusions. They allude to the world rather than represent it. The work is closer to poetry than prose, an extreme form of selection and condensing has taken place both to remove the irrelevant and to heighten the implied human presence. I think the world is a magical and endlessly fascinating place and believe it is an artist's role to remind people of this, but I also believe it is beyond direct representation. What sculptors do is to remind people of the sublime nature of the world by creating a physical and tangible awareness of the awe and mystery found in everyday aspects of the space we inhabit. "We shall not cease from exploration And the end of all our exploring Will be to arrive where we started And know the place for the first time." T.S. Eliot "Little Gidding" David O'Connor May 2002 |