Into the Future

Tonight I am remembering that about a month and a half back I had an idea for a multi-generational art piece, which I shared with my most beloved people.

If I had the skill to do so I would want to create a bronze sculpture, perhaps a human-sized figure leaning on a stick, face obscured by a hood, hand outstretched.

And a perhaps a plaque, reading something like:

Turn my face to the world
So I may see it passing by
Plant my feet by the thoroughfare
So we may meet face to face
Clasp my hand
To show our shared connection

But if any suspected the underlying goal of the piece none voiced the thought. The function of the poem is to embed directions for displaying the statue into the piece itself - I think now it might be better to have the text on a page held by the left hand, while the right hand is outstretched - so that whoever comes into possession of the statue after my death would know to place it at a location that gets a lot of foot traffic. In the long term the goal of the piece would be to have many hundreds and thousands of people touching the hand of the statue over time, as my impression is that such repeated handling will wear and transform the colour of that part of the statue to a more golden one.

The central idea is to create a quietly mass participatory artwork which over decades or centuries will show the connection of many human hands each making contact with the same object. An enduring marker to show we were and are here. But sculpture is hard. I don't know when or if I could make such a work especially when there are so many other projects I would like to complete.