There was a time, when I had time to be reading books continually, especially the classics. It was great that they were all out of copyright and cheap to get a hold of. Frankenstein, Dracula, Wuthering Heights and all of the works by HG Wells and Arthur Conan Doyle. I could understand why they were all classics, because they were bloody brilliant. Reading them was great fun story wise and it also helped improve on my dyslexia.
Gulliver's Travels was one which I loved. Written by another Irish man, Johnathan Swift just down the road from where I write this. I must admit it was a though read because of the Ye oldie English he used but I discovered that if I read the words to myself in a Ye oldie English accent I could easily understand.
The man behind the book, a synopsis
The fantasy lands were wonderful as was the satire of government and religions. From his life as a clergyman and as part of the inner circle of the Tory government in England it is easy to see where his inspiration lay. A man before his time but not much of a friend of Queen Anne who stood in to way of him getting a more cushy clergy job in England. So he was stuck in St Patrick Cathedral, Dublin as Dean Swift. His life was pretty complex and so I won't go into it all here.
Niall Magee, Alan Magee, Fergus Mulvany and myself were again back in Dublin Castles upper court yard and this year we were joined by Dutch carver Ludo Roders. Our self imposed theme for this year was a look at different Irish writers. One day I will make a post about the other works but for now I will just talk about my own where I chose Swift and his world famous story.
Back to the future
If you remember my Time machine sculpture from a few posts back you will recall that I was playing a bit with perspective and with this new piece I thought it was a good opportunity to bring the concept on another step. The scale of Gulliver in the book when he visited Lilliput made the little people seem about 6 inches to him. I thought it would be interesting for me to try and make a life sized Gulliver but only from one angle. All the rest of him would recede in a forced perspective. Hopefully I could get a bit of an optical illusion going on and that even though the sculpture was quite small it would give the viewer an interesting view as a Lilliputian.
The figure itself was not Gulliver but instead Dean swift himself. I wanted to explore the man rather than the book. He was dressed garb that he would have worn in the 17th century and I had him lying down feet first to the arriving audience.
A big feat
The feet for me were the most prominent part of the sculpture and I modeled them on my own, Yes I have pretty ugly feet. It was a lot of fun trying to blow them up to this size and play with textures for my skin calluses to bent toes. As an image when you entered the court yard it was really quite surprising to see two big feet lying there. It was only when you got closer that you could see his head peering down at you. As you walked a bit to the side you got the whole image. I had robbed as much sand as possible from the other sculptures and this is what I used to create the rest of the body with.
I really like sculptures like this, that reveal more story as you get closer to them.
Around the figure I made Chess pieces. This was to symbolise the politics around Swift that held him back from doing what he wanted. He was obviously a divisive figure in his day as he fought for what he thought was right on the islands of England and Ireland.
Originally I wanted to use real rope to tie him down but I just couldn't work out a way to keep it in perspective also. I figured people would get the idea that he was held down by his pose.
It was a very unusual piece. I do think I achieved the desired result even with all of the contrasting geometry in the environment around it. Experiencing it in reality was very different from the photos I have of it. It seemed that the eyes and brain were very willing to go with the illusion and it was something which I think photography just can't capture especially with the busy background.
I have a Timelapse of it's creation which I will share next time.
Ps
Thanks for reading. I use Steem to document my work as an ephemeral Sculptor of sand, snow and ice, amongst other things. This will hopefully give it a new life on the Steem blockchain. Below you will find some of my recent posts.
Sun dial for Joe Maize - sand sculpture
The time machine - sand sculpture
Look to the past - sand sculpture
