Lapita Coral
1998
Private Collection, Auckland.
Colony Series
The work reveals how time cannot be reversed. It draws parallels between the difficult but occasionally possible reconstruction of ancient Pacific, Lapita pottery shards and the impossibility of repair to an endangered coral reef.
I made a cardboard pattern before beginning the work. I then cut the wood sections with a jigsaw and used a chain-saw for surface texture finishing. The pieces were drilled and lightly burnt with a blow torch prior to joining. Using the traditional method for repairing antique ceramic vases, I drilled small holes in the wood and connected the sections together with copper wire.
'... It is a curious situation that the sea, from which life first came, should now be threatened by the activities of one form of that life. But the sea, though changed in a sinister way, will continue to exist, the threat is rather to life itself.'
Rachel Carson, 'The Sea Around Us', first published 1950, Oxford University Press, New York.
Dimensions: 1200mm diameter x 30mm.
Materials: Macrocarpa, acrylic paint, ash and copper wire and copper wire.
