Pachyderm Pelt (1998)

Artist's Statement

"Transgressions?": The exhibition consisted of eight large installations and sculptures by me with individual photographic interpretations by photographers Val Adamson and Barry Downard. Val Adamson photographed my works in appropriate outdoor and indoor environments and Barry Downard focused on making viewers more aware of detailed aspects of the works by producing enlarged computer-enhanced photographs of different sections of the sculptures.

In this exhibition I was exploring what we are carrying forward from the past and present into the new Millennium, both positively and negatively, and the works reflect global issues such as AIDs, El Nino, pollution, energy, war, poaching of large endangered mammals, computers and space travel. The base materials for the sculptures consisted of discarded industrial waste from factories that is used in the manufacture of functional fibre products. I chose this medium for its visual appeal and because plastic is a 20th Century invention which has impacted positively and negatively on our planet.

"The 1970's and 1980's saw a massive upsurge in illegal slaughter of elephants for their tusks. From 1979 to 1989 the world's elephant population was reduced by half. In Southern Africa elephant populations remained static ... Although the ivory trade ban has allowed elephants a breathing space we must not lose sight of the main threat to their long term survival - the uncontrolled population growth of homo sapiens and the habitat destruction that goes along with this. It will be a sad day when elephants are but a memory. We can only hope that we are not seeing the twilight of the gentle grey giants". (Chris and Tilda Stuart Africa's Vanishing Wildlife (1996)).