Artistic Development

When I was a child, the family spent some summer times in Upper New Harbour staying at Grandpa Gillie’s place. He was old with long white hair and a beard. He enjoyed to sit in the sun and whittle wood. This whittling really impressed me (but not as much as his ability to spit tobbaco juice such a long distance; as soon as my father returned from work it was back to Sangster’s Store to get chewing tobacco and a couple of sheets of corded black licorice).

A few days later, I was pointing out that I was bored with fishing and so had nothing to do. My father, an avid fisherman, was also very resourceful at kid management. Back up to the barn, he found an old board. Watch so you can do it yourself next time. Do you want a sail? No! I’ll have a motorboat! Grabbed his trusty hatchet and made the bow of a boat with a hole to tie my fishing line onto.

My father, who specialized in steel, was always showing me how to build things, draw images, get me to think up things to draw or build so as to amuse myself. One day we visited Miller Tibbett’s studio where he was doing a painting of Emmett Kelly as "Weary Willie" for my mother’s birthday. My father showed me how Miller had divided up a photo image with a grid, drew a corresponding grid on the canvas and was in the process of painting in a larger image so they looked similar, but one was real.

This was an exciting revelation. I had a photo of a soldier carring an M1 carbine and I wanted one. After my father extracted a well-worded promise that I would do whatever my mother said while he was away next week, I received a new pine board, air-dried, no warp or knots, as well as the use of his keyhole and coping saws with extra blades.

My first art teacher died when I was ten. After a few years of private instructions in the 2-dimensional world with Ina MacAskill I realized it wasn’t my forte.

My grand-uncle Haig was also involved in the steel industry and had lost an eye to a spark. My father used to build row boats in his basement so I heard many of Theo’s stories.

My maternal grandfather was a “former” with I Matheson’s foundry in New Glasgow most of his adult life. When I was 11 we inherited the family home and I was exposed to his toolbox of specialist woodworking tools.

My involvement with sculpture began in Halifax during the late sixties and was influenced by the concerns of the minimal and post-minimal artists of the time. Rather than concentrating on the traditional floor-based sculpture, I created mini-installations that depend upon walls, corners, ceilings, posts, etc. as an integral part of the work. Using prefabricated materials I constructed forms that are held together by the basic elements of sculpture: mass, weight, tension, balance, etc. A maritime background directly influenced my choice of materials and their juxtaposition. Already in these early works there is evidence of my concern with mystery, spirit, and the metaphysical.

This interest began when, as a child, I was with my father at a fish-and-game meet, where a Mi’kmaq medicine man gave my father advice on how to cure my pink-eye. During a summer vacation I travelled to BC where I met a native totem carver who enjoyed a energetic conversation about art and spirit. Later, when travelling in Africa through the World Encounter program, I had the fortune to consult with several shamans and artists, who gave me insightful advice. I also came in contact with totem poles in Cameroons.

Many of my early sculptures involve the interaction of positive and negative space and radiate an aura of intimidation manifest by the continuously opposing forces contained within them.

After moving to London, Ontario (1976), I initiated a series of sculptures WindDancers that utilize the natural movement of the wind as the spirit of the dancers. This involvement with natural phenomena led to my using erosion as a tool for making art, trees as the base for sculpture, and earth as a source of materials. These works reflected my growing interest in the elements of time and process and my continuing reluctance to exhibit works in the sterile environment of the gallery.

On my arrival in Alberta (1979) I visited the Columbia Ice Field and was impressed with the fact that glaciers had been, and still are, sculpting the face of the earth. This experience led to my enrollment in a graduate-level course, offered by Environmental Design, which consisted of the analysis of post-glacial terrain by the use of aerial and satellite stereo-photographs. My master’s thesis investigated the development of contemporary earthworks and their role in the evolution of sculpture. Out of this intensive involvement emerged the Meltdown and Outwash series, both of which are based on the processes of erosion/deposition and order/disorder, and engage the geomorphologic Big Four: forms made by processes acting on materials over a period of time. The result of this involvement has led to the execution of numerous earth-related pieces and plans for large-scale earthworks, as well as being expressed in two-dimensional forms via prints, process paintings, and videos

While developing the sculpture history survey course for the Western Community College in Stephenville (1982) I began contemplating the incorporation of historical aspects into my art, including the various links between traditional and modern sculpture and the division of sculpture into figurative and non-figurative and its evolution according to reductive principles.

While living in British Columbia (on the coast and in the North) I was stimulated through the resurgence of interest by the native people in their art, mythology, and past traditions. I have since spent decades researching and writing on the mythology of my own ancestors, the Celts. Subsequently, I began integrating these Celtic studies into my art which resulted in a series called Gods, Heroes, & Warriors. This series incorporates references to the history of art and refers to parallel developments in the history of mankind in general.

Another outgrowth of the Celtic research was the design of a multimedia performance work, on which my wife Rosemary Mountain, composer, would collaborate. In its first version (1989) it was called Hear, Here, a Celtic Year; then changed to the Harmony of Baal and we began work on one of the 8 festivals which we based on the Iberian-hero Viriato, and entitled Astolpas’s Daughter. Due to a lack of success in applications for funding, we have not yet been able to realize this work, but I continue to build a variety of props and work on the overall design.

Recently, I have returned to the WindDancers series to incorporate new technologies which will enable them to participate in an exciting multimedia collaboration. I am also working on the physical and overall design of the Interactive Multimedia Playroom, a project led by R. Mountain to explore vocabulary and strategies for discussing sound, especially in multimedia contexts.