Page 28 - Studio International - December 1974

People outside art will think you are concerned loose. The word carries a strong element of disclosure,
with building houses, roads or bridges. In addition 'Sculpture' carries the overtones of bringing to light what is already in being.
There is no term with which we can of a tradition in Western art older and more 'Work' is a word I at least frequently use in
satisfactorily replace 'Sculpture'. Even deeply imbedded than painting. 'The antique' connection with sculpture. One 'works' at a
'Construction-Sculpture' seems too narrow, too and all that is implied in that word, in the sculpture: when it is finished, revealed, it is
specialized. It may more accurately define what Renaissance and the Academies, the schools, 'a work', 'a complete work': then, and only
we are doing, but at the same time it cuts us off museums and cast rooms — everything dead but then, we say 'it works'. The word undergoes
from a great area of work already existing, piously enshrined in the heart of Western culture three marked changes of meaning, corresponding
which can manifestly not be described as can be identified with classical sculpture. The to the degree to which the sculpture is realized.
construction-sculpture, but with which we feel irony of using the term 'Sculpture' to describe Firstly and continuously one works at sculpture:
a strong affinity. By recognizing the name a hole in the ground, a typewritten sheet, a here it has the connotation of labour, because
`Sculpture' we effect a bridge between that work music hall performance, thus depends on the labour is also continuous and endless. But work
and our own; although there might seem to an pompous and empty respect which the word is towards an end: when that end is reached, the
outside observer nothing otherwise in common has accumulated over the course of centuries; worked-at thing becomes itself work. To have
between an open framework of steel sections of its propagation as an inaccessible ideal by worked at it does not mean to say that it is
and a carved stone figure of the Buddha, by critics and academics — essentially the same kind 'laboured' — precisely the opposite. When
calling both sculpture we relate the two objects of people now (whether posing as artists or not) sculpture is achieved it becomes active, it works
in a manner that goes beyond a mere most active in degrading the word. on us. So we have 'striving towards',
classification: which, in consideration of their Those cut off from the practice of sculpture 'completion', and 'influence over' others, all
separate and strongly distinctive character as have traditionally inflated and are currently contained in the slightest modification of use of
things, would assign them to 'abstract metal demeaning it. Those who in fact make sculpture the same word, which by virtue of being the
construction' and 'stone religious carving' and have used the term for what they do, and not same word always carries the alternative
leave them irrevocably apart. without pride. Donatello was as much, perhaps meanings in reserve. I have considered how the
What is it these two random examples have more, a modeller than a carver: Rodin's whole word 'work' can carry and focus thought when
in common, that they can be thoughtfully enterprise was founded on modelling: David used in the context of sculpture. 'Sculpture'
comprehended under the name 'Sculpture'? Smith carved only a handful of pieces. Yet all itself is nothing like so powerful, so containing,
Or, more appropriately, what is it about the considered themselves 'Sculptors', whatever the a term. But its persistence has meaning, too.
name 'Sculpture' that can continue to process or material. The inappropriateness of the precise craft
comprehend both these examples, and remain We might ask why the term 'Modelling' has description conceals and contains the more
an active, rather than a generally descriptive never gained ascendancy in English or the Latin general, energetic significance present in the
term? After all, we can and do refuse it as when languages, when it is specific to much of the word.
one says: 'That's not sculpture,' of an object best work of the Renaissance and of the revival Martin Heidegger, tracing the meaning of the
that manifestly is sculpture, and imply thereby of sculpture in the nineteenth century word 'truth', notes the derivation of the Greek
a signal disapproval. Even to give it, to award There seems to me something soft about the word we translate as 'truth', aletheia. This
the name 'Sculpture' to an object, may in some word, appropriate enough to the process and comes from the prefix a-, meaning 'not', and
circumstances then be regarded as a positive act, material, but hardly to the artist as `modeller', lethe meaning 'darkness', 'hiddenness'. So truth
an inclusive welcome. or to the finished work as 'model' — here indeed is literally, what is discovered, disclosed, revealed,
If we use the word for more than the sake of one enters a vast network of confusing brought, even torn from darkness into light.
convenience, what is it that makes it positive associations — the model as the subject of the It is then not something constantly obvious and
and energetic? Like 'Painting', 'Sculpture' work, and as copy or reduction of it, and so on. apparent, but requires work, effort, from those
describes both the activity of making, and the 'Model', 'modelling', are as over-specific, and as who want it. Nor is it absolute and permanent,
made thing itself. We talk of painting as a distracting terms for sculpture as we found otherwise there would be no need to seek it
profession, and of a painting; of the painter, 'construction' to be. more than once. 'The establishing of truth in
who paints. Likewise, 'sculpture', 'a sculpture', `Sculpture' fulfils the need for a word that the work is the bringing forth of a being such as
'the sculptor' — but 'to sculpt?' The verb has would give the art space: that will bring a never was before and will never come to be
never gained wide currency, and I suspect the tradition through the present, without defining again,' writes Heidegger. Each time truth is
reason is that the active tense recalls the actual past or future work in terms of a present mode revealed it is different, 'in the light of the work
meaning of the word too precisely for comfort: or technique. 'Poetry' is another such word, by which it is revealed. The comparison between
because sculpture literally means carving, which has perisisted as long as 'Sculpture', in what I take to be the central core of meaning in
engraving, and we can't say 'we sculpt', when spite of, perhaps because of the gap between its the word 'sculpture' and Heidegger's conception
we regard what we do, with the same confidence basal meaning (Greek poiesis, 'making') and the of 'truth' seems to me strangely compelling. [2]
that the painters can say 'we paint'. conventional image of poetry as 'possession', an
Moreover, in recent usage 'Painting' has uncontrolled, inspirational lyricism, from Plato's
become a closer and more apt description for Republic on.
what painters have actually been about, with Finally, what is there in the word 'Sculpture'
the concern for the physical constituents of itself rather than its association and usage that
their art, paint as colour and as substance, the modifies, even determines what it is we do,
nature of the ground, the dimensions of the thinking of ourselves as sculptors?
support and so on. During the same period 'Sculpture' is a hard, precise word, suggesting
'Sculpture' has been used deliberately and the resistance of the material, as definitely as
perversely to describe natural phenomena, modelling suggests softness, pliability. Sculpture
dramatic events, photographs and so forth, and is carving, cutting into; modelling is moulding,
this has been possible under the heading of manipulation, modulation. Sculpture is clear, [1] Wallace Stevens: 'Notes Towards a Supreme
sculpture, where painting would have been an irrevocable decision; modelling is modification, Fiction', part I 'It Must be Abstract', from 'Selected
Poems', London, 1953
impermissible title, because sculpture was addition and subtraction. Sculpture is pure
[2] Magda King: 'Heidegger's Philosophy', Oxford,
already in common use to describe an activity subtraction. But it is not just taking away: it is
1964. Martin Heidegger: 'The Origin of the Work of
whose connection with the word was apparently taking away in order to reveal what is there. Art', in 'Poetry, Language, Thought', New York, 1971