I’ve written about this carving before...about my great, great niece’s skepticism that it was me who was making it; about the extra effort I went to getting its weight down to 40 pounds; and about the shark carving inspired by the encounter with my g,g niece.
Today I got notification that I won 1st place in the 3-D category in Hopkinsville’s Pennyroyal Art Exhibition. I was shooting for best of show, but I’ll take what I can get.
Here are some other points of view.
This was great news, but my mind is already elsewhere. In 2003, my wife Alison painted 4 portraits of Kentucky women, including Katherine Peden. Recently, Ms Peden’s nephew contacted Alison for permission to include a facsimile of her painting in a small, soon to be open museum honoring Ms Peden in her home town, Hopkinsville, KY. After Alison granted her permission, he sent a follow up message asking if I could make a bust of Ms Peden, also for the museum, and asked me to phone him to discuss it. Having had enough discussions that fell through with the mention of price, I first sent him an email with a price range for big & little busts. He didn’t flinch and wanted me to go ahead, so I did make the follow up call to iron out some details.
This will be my first commissioned portrait of a woman. I previously made a bust of Ida B. Wells, but that was self sponsored and it took some doings merely to give it away. At the moment, all I’ve done is make print outs of various points of view of Ms Peden at about age 40 and attempted to find her nose. In doing that, I’ve made numerous false starts and wound up carrying most of my wormy maple billets out in the field to rot. I believe I’m going with a sassafras billet, even though it’s taken me 5 starts to get some hint of a face without distracting black streaks.
When this opportunity first came to my attention, I didn’t have a lot of enthusiasm for it. Then, after trimming and stapling the half dozen points of view to my story board, pondering the lack of any mention of personal relationships in her bio, I felt I could see written right there in her visage the sacrifices she must have made in the personal sphere by pioneering women’s participation in the public sphere. Tears welled up. I turned them loose.
I have to go now. I have work to do.