DONNA DODSON: June 2010

Sunday, June 27, 2010

Sand Sculpture Event 2010

The fun started Friday, June 18th when 300 tons of sand was dropped on Hampton Beach and Greg Grady's group of sand sculptors started pounding up the sponsor site. The entire area is illuminated for night viewing through June 30th. The event is funded by the Hampton Beach Village District and Sponsors, in cooperation with The Hampton Area Chamber of Commerce and The NH Division of Parks.

This was my first time sculpting sand and I made a sand elephant and a sand jaguar for the demo site. All of the Master Sand Sculptors contribute creative pieces to the site and the logos of all of the major sponsors of the event are sculpted onto the demo site. This year's theme was Shangri-La or heaven on earth and I had a great time making magical works on art on the beach. The sand used for this event has more silt in it than regular beach sand and it is 'pounded up' or packed tightly using a tamp and water into wood and/or plastic forms which are then sculpted into temporary works of art on site.

Wednesday, June 16, 2010

The Moose Myth

The Moose Myth

There is a story told of twin moose brothers, each robust and noble, who shared the Northern Kingdom. One fine day they met in a glade and neither would yield. They charged and impacted with a resounding crash of angry power. In the ensuing battle they entangled antlers in a death lock. Unable to separate, they continued to battle. After days of throwing their enmeshed antlers and bodies about, unable to eat or drink, exhausted, they were on the brink of death. A small child came upon the feuding but now feeble twins and offered to free them, but only if they would promise to live in peace. They thankfully accepted the offer.

Freed, the twins stood on two feet in honor of their human friend and lived their lives striving to solve conflicts with negotiation and compromise. They agreed that one would live by the sea and rule over the Portsmouth waterfront and all the bridges and seaways linking NH to the world. The other mighty moose would rule inland, near the confluence of the Nashua and Merrimack Rivers, majestically protecting the vital and diverse city of Nashua.

Two sculptures celebrate this myth:

Moose Myth Nashua
Bicentennial Park
66 Main Street
Nashua NH

Moose Myth Portsmouth
Market Square
Portsmouth NH

By Donna Dodson & Andy Moerlein

*Update: Foster's Daily Democrat and The Daily Portsmouth covered this piece.

Tuesday, June 1, 2010

Nashua Sculpture Symposium 2010

The artists, Donna Dodson and Andy Moerlein will build a Moose Myth in BiCentennial Park at 66 Main Street during the 2010 Nashua Sculpture Symposium May 16th - June 6th. This 20’ tall sculpture will incorporate Dodson's vocabulary of animal headed mythological figures and Moerlein's technique of sapling construction. This piece will reference the iconic quality of the moose and the mysterious nature of this wild animal. The monumental moose headed figure, striding along the river walk, will be a symbolic landmark. The overall feeling of the piece will be transcendent and magical.

Collaboration:
The collaboration between Moerlein and Dodson is born from a love of the wild. Moerlein takes inspiration from events in the natural world that leave visual marks which strike a narrative chord in the artist. Dodson takes inspiration from the mysterious nature of animals that spark her imagination. Together these artists seek to create a piece that will surge up from the earth as if it was a creation of nature.

There will be a reception with the artists on Sunday June 6th at Greeley House on Front Street in Nashua, NH at 2:30p.

Moose Myth drawing by Andy Moerlein, pencil on paper, 2010

Moose Myth

In the beginning,
a grid of all Earth’s possible fragrances
was encoded into a glyph of a Moose etched upon a rock.
Her own breath begat it as beast.

The heady suspense of being alive
pulsed its alertness into the erection of ears.
A percussion of antlers spread wide
to resound the essence of listening.

Sight, the seedbed of thought,
was blocked by the swelling hill of nose
as the Bull inhaled the love of the Planet.

A poem by Charlanne Kallay
In artistic collaboration
With sculptures by Donna Dodson

*Update: The Nashua Telegraph covered this piece in a recent front page article.

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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.