DONNA DODSON: Elephant Parade

Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Elephant Parade

For Immediate Release

Elephant Parade: Art by Donna Dodson on exhibit at New Hampton School’s Galletly Gallery

New Hampton, NH, March 13, 2010 – New Hampton School’s Galletly Gallery is pleased to host sculpture by Donna Dodson from April 1 through May 1, 2010. The public is cordially invited to an opening reception on Friday, April 2, from 5:30 to 7 pm. The reception will feature the “Elephant Princess” jewelry collection by Knight&Hammer Jewelers, inspired by Dodson’s work.

Elephant Parade is a gathering of 15 elegant wood sculptures of the female form with elephant heads. They range in size from 1 to 4 feet tall. Dodson uses the flow of the natural wood grain with the form of the sculpture to reveal and enhance the girl, woman, queen or goddess within. Their mouths are closed, symbolizing the mysteries they embody. Created as archetypes, these figures evoke a personal experience for the viewer. “My artwork celebrates the mystical relationship between human beings and the animal kingdom," says Dodson. "The challenge is to fuse feminine sensuality, sexuality and soul with a well-proportioned figurative vocabulary."

In November of 2009, Dodson exhibited a similar series of work, Elephant Tribe at the Boston Sculptors Gallery in Boston’s SoWa arts district. Says Dodson: "Both installations play upon themes of family identity and individualism, group dynamics, rank and order, kinship and clan, totem, mascot, personal spirituality, feminism and wild animals.”

The Elephant Princess jewelry collection is designed by Joseph Knight of Knight&Hammer Jewelers. For Knight, Dodson’s work "merged ancient cultural ideology with modern linear lines." Sharing a commitment for a better world, Dodson and Knight partnered with Dr. Stuart Pimm, founder of Saving Species. The “Elephant Princess” series, in necklace and earrings, is a limited edition series whose sale benefits "Saving Species." All jewelry is created by American craftsmen in fine sterling silver.

For more information, visit www. KnightandHammer.com and SavingSpecies.com. The Elephant Princess jewelry will only be on display at the reception, Friday, April 2.

Poetry written by Charlanne Kallay will accompany the elephants on parade. There will be a poetry reading and gallery talk on Friday April 2nd during the reception.

The Galletly Gallery is located on the second floor of New Hampton School’s Moore Center. The gallery is open to the public Monday through Friday from 8 am to 4 pm and on Saturdays from 9 am to noon. For directions and more information, please call 603-677-3513 or visit www.newhampton.org.

Update: The NY blogger, Joanne Mattera featured me as one of 3 sculptors to watch. I'm in good company with Nancy Azara and Ursula Von Rydingsvaard this month.

Prom Queen, 31" tall, poplar wood & paint, 2009
Photo credit: Clements Howcroft Photography

4 comments:

Art Trip said...: I know your work is not intended this way, but having fun seeing them as variations of Ganesha.; March 25, 2010 at 9:01 AM
Donna Dodson said...: Thank you. Perhaps not in a literal sense, but in spirit, they are inspired by Ganesh.; March 25, 2010 at 11:29 AM
Anonymous said...: I just had to also leave a comment. I felt that this carving is an animal spirit trapped in the wood. The Amazonian tribes believe that as we go through life that we have a spirit guide who shows us the future. This usually happens under the effects of a consumed narcotic beverage. The spirit guide is usually an animal, jaguar, snake, bird, ect. Because all your art revolves around the elephant or other animals, I tend to think that you are an old soul with an Elephant spirit guide. The wood carvings are quite beautiful and there is always a market forcarved Art . Carving tiny breasts on your pieces reminds me of the ancient Egyptian gods. They placed an animal head on a human body for most of their deities. I think childbirth was ruled by a god with a hippopotamus head and a feminine body. This is a really clever art style. The sensuous elephant trunk becomes an object de art.; April 20, 2010 at 7:41 PM
Donna Dodson said...: Thank you. Egyptian art is a huge inspiration for my artwork. I like the idea of an Elephant spirit guide. Maybe it's why I am so headstrong. The sensuality of the wood is one of the biggest pleasures of sculpting this medium.; April 20, 2010 at 7:50 PM

Artist Statement

‘My artwork celebrates the mystical relationship between human beings and the animal kingdom. Because there were no icons of women in the church that I grew up in, my vision is to create them. Through hybrid female-animal forms that I sculpt in wood, I flesh out sensuality, sexuality and soul with a well-proportioned figurative vocabulary. The natural grain of the wood interacts with the form and shape of my sculptures in a descriptive way, suggesting nostrils, and nipples or garments and fabric textures. I often stylize each piece to enhance the girl, woman, princess, queen or goddess within. The mouths, or in some cases beaks, are closed symbolizing the mysteries they embody. These figures are sculpted in sizes ranging from the intimate to the monumental. I use color in both subtle and bold ways to activate each piece. My inspiration comes from ancient iconography and mythological imagery.’

About

Donna Dodson has been carving images out of wood for nearly 20 years. Her sculptures explore feminine beauty and evoke humor and playfulness but also grace, power and emotional strength. Her unique vision responds to the relation of animals to the human spirit that have existed since ancient times. Her figures are almost always female and range in size from the intimate to the monumental.

Dodson’s pre-med studies and her passion for Egyptian art led her to study wood and stone sculpture. African sculptures and Native American totems also influence her work.

She uses logs of osage orange wood from her grandfather’s farm in Illinois, and ash, cherry, locust and maple from New England.

Dodson has worked in a series using an elephant headed goddess to explore female figureheads in positions of power. Recently, Dodson created large scale outdoor pieces, engaging in a public dialogue about her work. The site became a more prevalent theme. Today, Dodson has returned to creating statement pieces such as a cardinal goddess for the women of the Catholic Church who aspire to be ordained and Madam President- a monument to the first female president of the USA.

Bio

Donna Dodson is an American sculptor who has exhibited her artwork around the world. Dodson has completed successful residencies in Verbier Switzerland, Cusco Peru, Keelung Taiwan and Ringkoebing Denmark. Donna is currently a Scholar at the Brandeis University Women’s Studies Research Center and a Fellow at the St Botolph Club in Boston. Dodson’s recent show, “Sheroes” at the Boston Sculptors Gallery was met with critical acclaim. Donna was a 2022 Fulbright US Scholar at Q21/MuseumsQuartier in Vienna Austria working as an artist in residence with her host institution Tricky Women/Tricky Realities, the world’s only animation festival for women. Dodson has won grants from the Puffin Foundation, Massachusetts Cultural Council, the New Hampshire Guild of Woodworkers and the George Sugarman Foundation. Her work is in the permanent collection of the World Chess Hall of Fame in St Louis Missouri, the Provincetown Art Museum, the Art Complex Museum and the Fuller Craft Museum in Massachusetts, The Noyes Art Museum in New Jersey and the Davistown Museum in Maine. Donna's work has been reviewed in the Boston Globe, Sculpture Magazine, The Daily Beast, Hyperallergic and Artnet. She is currently represented by the Abigail Ogilvy Gallery in Boston and Los Angeles. She is a former member of the Boston Sculptors Gallery. Dodson is a graduate of Wellesley College. Donna is a freelance writer whose articles in newspapers, magazines and blogs demonstrate the economic impact and global reach of the Boston arts sector. Her recent paper, “What do we call courageous women” was presented at the Society for Classical Studies annual meeting in 2022 and was published in Queering the Amazons a special issue of the Journal of Lesbian Studies.

Inspirations

"There is a crack in everything, that's how the light gets in."

-Leonard Cohen

"... I think one's art goes only as far and as deep as [one's] love goes..."

-Andrew Wyeth

"art is valuable because it challenges, inspires, and enables us to see ourselves in much more interesting ways"
-Mickey Cartin

" the thing that I had to do was to ... work super hard in the hope that someday it would pay off. And in using that term I don't mean necessarily money, but just the fact that I would have more depth and dimension both as a human being and as an artist."
-Ed Paschke

“Fashion is what seems beautiful now but looks ugly later; art can be ugly at first but it becomes beautiful later.”
-Steve Jobs

"...remember that collecting art is an act of love. It isn’t about what you pay for a work, or how rich (or not) you become when you one day sell it, but the depth of your enjoyment in the time you live with it."
-Abigail R. Esman

"[Patronage] is a gift, in the form of money, in exchange for [my] gift, in the form of music."

-Amanda Palmer

"Art is the crucial interface between the imagination and reality, the thing that makes life deeper and broader than what it might be without such insight."

-Todd Levin

"If they hadn't told me I was ugly, I would never have searched for my beauty."

-Gabourey Sidibe

"Never grow a wishbone, daughter, where your backbone ought to be."

-Clementine Paddleford

Great artists “must be shaken by the naked truths that will not be comforted. This divine discontent, this disequilibrium, this state of inner tension is the source of artistic energy.”

-Humphrey Trevelyan

"Life should be lived so vividly and intensely that thoughts of another life or of a longer life are not necessary."

-Marjory Stoneman Douglas

“When people say that poetry is a luxury, I suspect that the people doing the saying have had things pretty easy. A tough life needs a tough language - and that is what poetry is.” Jeannette Winterson

Artistic Process

When I start a piece of work I need to evoke such a strong feeling about each piece that I can dare to listen to the piece, to make mistakes - to just create. It is the emotional investment in the act of creation that crystallizes the work for me.

Sometimes the idea or concept comes first, and I imagine what the piece will be when completed. More often I work from intuition. Once completed I see the intentions behind the piece, or the desire from which it is born. Artists who inspire me include Jessica Stockholder and Katharina Fritsch. Stockholder uses color as a transformational visual device, changing the way we see form. Fritsch creates sculptures of sacred figures that become pop-icons through her use of color. In the same way I work with various kinds and grains of wood accented by color.

My artwork is about self expression, autobiography, and self redemption. Each sculpture is independent and heroic, but each is connected to the body of my total work. Each is made greater and honored by its association with those that have preceded it, but keeps its own sacred identity. Each reflects my realization that I am a self-made woman.

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Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Elephant Parade

4 comments: