Amanda Sisk
I am slightly in awe of Amanda’s talent and this little computer can give you only a fleeting glimpse of that talent.
Sculpture has presence and sculpture has depth in every sense which a two dimensional computer screen or a photograph can not begin to communicate.
With this handicap and only these three pictures, “borrowed” from her some months ago, I start the process of exposing Amanda! Like all the best artists she will claim she has not much to show at the moment but she will I am sure release some more soon.
A technical note only. The line of the jaw, the fine line of nose and lips indicate considerable skill and refinement. What particularly captures me is the position of the head very carefully chosen to suit the powerful presence this work must exude. The contrast between flesh and bare medium conveys a shiver combined with the blindfold. Both artist and subject have powerful personality.
With no clues to a story behind this work it becomes intriguing. The two heads are believable and clearly captivated by and leading our eyes to the torso’s breast. Three other ideas come to mind: map, decaying and alluvia mud.
Sculpture has presence and sculpture has depth in every sense which a two dimensional computer screen or a photograph can not begin to communicate.
With this handicap and only these three pictures, “borrowed” from her some months ago, I start the process of exposing Amanda! Like all the best artists she will claim she has not much to show at the moment but she will I am sure release some more soon.
A technical note only. The line of the jaw, the fine line of nose and lips indicate considerable skill and refinement. What particularly captures me is the position of the head very carefully chosen to suit the powerful presence this work must exude. The contrast between flesh and bare medium conveys a shiver combined with the blindfold. Both artist and subject have powerful personality.
With no clues to a story behind this work it becomes intriguing. The two heads are believable and clearly captivated by and leading our eyes to the torso’s breast. Three other ideas come to mind: map, decaying and alluvia mud. **
PS Please visit Chris Miller's studio over on my Blog of Sculptors and Artists Studios before you go.
Labels: Amanda Sisk, Friends, Lady American, Sculpture
posted by Robert at 8:48 pm
21 Comments:
Ah, Amanda...
I'm looking forward to her revision of the website. I do want to see the new work--although I hope she isn't dumping all the old forever.
Yes, she is talented--and she is young. Who knows what she will be in ten years?
wow, I have never seen a blind fold scuplture like that before very cool.
p.s.
I forgot to answer your earlier question about the man in the painting. Well, that is actually a Dark Shadows studio stills of Angalique and Barnabus Collins the vampire, I just bogarted it. Speaking, I have still been thinking of that picture you took in the victoria and albert it was in a wood frame, I was thinking of asking you if I could use it as a profile pic for when I felt porcelain and or fragile. I have never asked anyone anything like that and do not really know if it is proper. Its just a thought and maybe the Victoria and Albert have rules, so I totally understand. It just seems like it would be a great representation.
oh, I loaded another song with words. I dont really sound so childish.
Susangaligue
Of course you may use it. I suppose if anyone has the copyright I do because I took the photo.
Amanda has put this forward:
The relief sculpture reflects thoughts on the story of Pygmalion and Galatea. It has always frustrated me that Pygmalion's ideal woman was one of ideal physical beauty, which fades. What of her mind? Or character? Thus the female figure in the relief holds a brain in her hand. If she were sculpting, I think she'd include a mind. There is an overall decay to the work because either mode of "sculpting" another being to our own wishes and desires is an unhealthy one.
WOW. I love this post -- your generosity in sharing her work, and her amazing work.
Craft applied to the highest best most powerful beautiful uses.
Hey Thanks!
I got that user pic up! I guessed that it was porcelain, you should let me know if that is wrong.
It is so fantastic.
Amanda is such a romantic !
A hundred years ago she would have been filling the great cemeteries of Europe with sad/erotic figures.
Well, Mr. Miller, I may yet. My blasted lungs have collapsed again, right after critiques and in time for vacation, so I am not able to go sketching amongst the tombs this weekend (but I will be braving the Bargello to see an exhibit of a lesser-known sculptor...if they allow cameras, I can document it for you). Burial grounds -- what an advantage over museums: no throngs of tourists, peace to work in, the elements to add their own touches to stone, bronze. No one wants to be at San Miniato in the rain...and the Tuscan sun keeps them away, too. What a delight for me.
I suppose there is some small, strange market for figurative tomb sculpture these days? What with headstones carved by machinery and template...yes, perhaps you have highlighted my calling for me :).
I'll throw in a few cheerful maidens for you - for as there is joy in life, there is joy in death.
Hmmm. How did I become admin in this domain?
only the most important people get 2 spelling errors :o)
made the corrections. Thanks for letting me use that photo. I have really enjoyed your blogs.
Robert--
Still no new Admanda! Website cocoons take such a long time.
But I'm very glad you did this.
Amanda--
Perhaps being translated into an "admin" means that you are now in control of your days and can chase all pesky reviewers and bothersome people away: because you are the administrator in charge, brain in hand. Well, in head!
Of course, Chris is right. And "admin" is not romantic.
No problem with brain in hand or in head, she has it all in mind. If her admins good too I can't see a problem.
I found a small picture of another work of hers that I admired enought to download. I will add it now.
How beautiful Amanda's work is. I am truly suprised (in a good way) and very jealous of her skill.
I look forward to seeing more.
Well. I threw that tiny piece away last week! Next time I should ship it to Iona (lovely name, Iona - it makes me think not so much of an isle, but of a tree...my good friend in London is Rowan, also a tree).
Marly: This website update is going to take a long, long time. I'll try to post this week. I'm feeling well enough to get to the museum and Pietrasanta soon. I wish I could fold you up neatly into a travel bag for the marble quarries. They seem to me a magical place, full of figures waiting in white - or for you, powerful tablets awaiting chiseled word.
Robert,
This was such a good thing to do...
Amanda,
Do not throw so much away! I regret throwing away hundreds of poems--there was youth in them! And "youth's a stuff will not endure."
I believe in throwing away. And yet, I have tossed too much. I would have liked to dream over them now and then, or metamorphose them, later on.
Think I already told Robert how much I like the name "Iona." How tasteful they were, Iona's parents!
I do wish you had a magical handbag, and that I could pop out and go for a walk with you. That would be splendid, particularly on a dark, foggy day--a little Italian sun would be so pleasant.
I've matured a bit in the realm of destructive tendencies (at least, I hope so). My favorite route is to give work away (rather than always burn things in claw-foot bathtubs or shatter terracotta busts with hammers, as refreshing as these activities can be). Someone will love a piece if I don't, and I then know where to find old work for reference. I used to live with friends who would dumpster-dive after a cycle of purge, and my mentor was superb at recycling my rejects: on more than one occasion, I found awfully familiar terracotta studies on the desks of various IU Deans and in academic offices.
Do I spy Twelfth Night?
I too rescued something from the bin the other day. I recommend it!
Hoard, you just never know when you might need it!!!!
What is love? 'tis not hereafter;
Present mirth hath present laughter;
What's to come is still unsure;
In delay there lies no plenty;
Then come kiss me, sweet and twenty,
Youth's a stuff will not endure.
Yes, you do!
But I still say that what's to come is better than one's 20's. I could do my 30's over...
Genie and Genius what a delight to have you both on my blog quoting not just the Bard but Twelfth Night no less. Probably my favourite, or at least was in my Salad days. (That was from the other one I loved- A and C.)
You wait ‘till I get the Azaleas on screen!
I like these works a lot; they seem on the verge of dissolving back into shapeless mud (even the blindfold seems more like a primeval rip across the sculpted visage), barely there... reminiscent of those monumental unfinished Michelangelos and Rodins, but on a smaller scale.
Fantastic.. Associative art, reminding of creation, being part-of, Nature's negligence, beauty as a varnish, as a mere idea, at the same time beauty as emerging from mud and clay, etc.
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