Recently, I held a long-awaited, in-person, naming session for several of my sculptures!
Over the last couple years, I had resorted to soliciting some online naming efforts to try to keep up with the pace of new works I’ve been creating. However, response was low, and the process generally lacked the excitement and deep sense of connection that comes from developing consensus about the story and name for a piece.
For the March Sculpture of the Month, I present one of the pieces named during that first, in-person session:
Journey of the Soul’s Release
Getting a live naming group together turned out to have its difficulties, as well! Nevertheless, I took it on as a personal challenge because I see these naming sessions as my contribution for us to begin reconnecting with one another in person, again.
In the end, 4 enthusiastic souls attended – one of whom excitedly remembered participating in my last naming event, held at Gallery Mar in Carmel. This group included a quilt maker, a teacher, and two University of California Santa Cruz employees. Although this session was smaller than my usual naming groups of 6-8, the participants were all super engaged with the process — so much so that we ended up naming three new works, including the one above!
As you may know, the group naming process involves talking about the story we all see in the sculpture until we reach some consensus and arrive at a name. This is important because consensus of any sort – and about art especially – often seems impossible these days, but these naming collaborations prove otherwise.
To facilitate our discussion, I shared input from several others who previously commented about a name for this sculpture online, as well as my own initial thoughts. These focused on the Greek myth of Charon ferrying the souls of the dead across the River Styx to the underworld by boat. The group could see this connection but also suggested a wider story that touches on other after-death myths, like the Viking story of Valhalla. I also commented that the angel at the top of the piece might symbolize a soul rising from the underworld, like Icarus’s soul arising again to the skies.
Ultimately, the name Journey of the Soul’s Release seemed to include all our ideas.
This naming adventure felt truly inspiring for all involved and reaffirmed that the naming process for my sculptures has the power to create connection among a community of strangers and move our understanding of the sculptures and the messages they contain forward, into the world.
I still have quite a few unnamed pieces, and I’m dedicated to sharing the inspiration of my work for a post-quarantined world, so I intend to hold more naming sessions soon. If you might want to participate in these unique, interactive sessions in the future, please reply to this email to let me know.
I hope this sculpture, or perhaps one of my others, lends inspiration to the next phase of your life.
