Reclaimed steel, lead, handwoven copper wire net, plastic, twine, wool, silk, bones, feathers, glass
300cms (diameter) x 240cms (h)
2019
Photo by Ann Cook
Created for Re-Formation, a site-responsive exhibition at Bishops Palace curated by Heritage Courtyard Gallery.
Inspired by a mixture of myth, religion and contemporary thought.
Dragons are a common theme at the Palace, they appear in several architectural details. Fiona was captivated by the dragon chandelier in Bishops Palace. In mythology, Bishop Jocelin slayed a dragon. Other elements that interested her: the coat of arms - crossed swords (representing battle/power) and interlocking keys at the grand arched entrance. The Bishops’ mitre is like a crown. The lead and stained glass window and Christian narrative paintings in the chapel, the soaring vertical structures in architecture surrounding the Palace, especially the gothic cathedral. The history of the palace construction, built up, then parts fell down like rubble.
Christs’s crown of thorns is a symbol of his suffering to save us. ‘They know not what they do’, he said from the cross. With our planet now at risk of mass extinction, we need to re-think our belief system. Increasingly, Fiona feels religion has a part to play in world destruction. Hypocrisy, unnecessary wealth, power, greed, patriarchal edicts, stories altering fact, perversities… Religion is a human construct. The work questions history and religion, suggesting a fluidity of ‘truth’, which depends on perspective; poststructuralism.
Re-formation calls for a new vision. Reformed thinking, reformed materials, re-purposed, transformed. Mutability; nothing is stable. A familiar form made from unfamiliar materials.
Tall steel struts - architectural, anthropomorphic - suggest powerful religious figures; upstanding but fallible. Some cross over, like swords or thorns. Lead drips down, fluid. They support a soft woven construction embedded with glass dragon forms, reminiscent of a collapsed stained glass window. The weaving of myth into fact. Are dragons extinct dinosaurs?
Grand pillars of society caught with their pants down.
© Copyright Fiona Campbell. All rights reserved, 2021
Photo by Ann Cook
Photo by Ann Cook
Photo by Dominic Weston