This shows the process of a commission for Spellman-Brady Interior Design Co. in their design for the upcoming Via Christi Hospital in Wichita, KS. The designers are creating a beautiful space for the hospital and have selected me as an artist that can execute a fitting set of sculptures for the lobby and chapel. Spellman-Brady designers showed me the character of the space including the colors, textures, and mood. They introduced their concepts and logistics, with images that showed me both what they were looking for, and what they wanted to avoid. In turn, I took the information that they gave me and presented drawings and concept proposals for their approval and eventual proposal to the hospital. What results is a project that will delight the owners (the hospital), excite my client (Spellman-Brady), and fascinate me in an artistic pursuit that is perfectly in my sweet spot! The first will be a life-sized sculpture of St. Teresa of Avila. She is to be depicted in her ecstatic state of inspiration. This is a very ambitious and difficult piece to sculpt because of the mood and expression that is so very fleeting, but necessarily locked into a sculpture that can last thousands of years. Animated, exhuberant, and happy expressions are always the most difficult to do well because we are not used to seeing the expression held, as in a pose, but rather flashed and moved through. One will notice that sculptures or paintings where the artist attempts to do an accurate rendering of these expressions, especially of transcendant states, will often seem very plastic, like the fake smiles in poor photographic sessions. Bernini, who executed the most successful sculpture of St. Teresa to date, got around the problem in an interesting way . . . but more on that later. The second sculpture is a Christus Rex, or Resurrected Christ for the Via Christi Chapel. I am imagining this piece as a depiction of His ascension and victory while the cross is transformed from an instrument of torture to an instrument of glory.
Via Christi
