Material : bronze, hickory, cardboard
Location : LOCAL, Apartment with Fillip, Vancouver BC, 2008
Description : Bronze sledgehammer in shipping container with packing slip stating number in addition. Presented in a limited edition of thirty. Three variants : 10 LB, 15 LB and 20LB. Sledgehammer traded and gifted to various individuals across Canada.
Detailed Description :I see the sledgehammer as a model for how I construct sculpture. Lucas is in homage to the relationship of interior and exterior traits of material that are a modulated, decentralized body. Lucas is an example of utilizing the materials’ core value, form and function coming together to construct sculpture that relates directly with my day-to-day experience. The form of Lucas addresses the body of sculpture as a physical and intellectual activity.
Lucas embodies the potentiality of a sledgehammer. The work is both a sculpture and an embodiment of the practical or utilitarian usage of a tool. In its fabrication, the individual parts operate with all the concerns of a sledgehammer’s utility. The integrity of a sledgehammer is upheld; form and function are maintained. All the parts within the object relate to each other symbiotically; friction is used to hold the parts together in relation to the form. Every component introduced to the object, down to the paint and text, has significance to the object’s utilitarian function.
Lucas is brought into the historical lineage/dialogue of sculpture by using bronze instead of iron. The utilization of bronze as a material in this work is one of a historical strategy. The physical/intellectual effort I put into Lucas when related to utilitarian concerns of function critiques the process of sculpture. The bronze is too soft, therefore having no practical use as its image implies. This futility is used to create tension between an activity of sculpture and one of producing products. Initially the bronze challenges or poses a question to how we view the use of bronze in the object as a practical material for a sledgehammer. This work combines the impractical application of bronze with its traditional use in monumental sculpture thus subverting the utilitarian purpose of the sledgehammer. Choosing a historical frame for the context relinquishes the work from relying on the conceptual framework of the gallery. The work stands on its own, utilizing the context of the gallery to bend and extract meaning from its surroundings.