Estuary/Phase VII: Tethered  Flight

2009

Materials:  rice paper, glue, wire, fishing poles, pvc, tape

These sculptures are part of the Estuary Series, an ongoing project to create artwork and installations inspired by our local wetlands.  Migratory birds are a key ingredient in a wetland habitat, and wetlands are an essential milestone in a migratory bird’s journey – often a place to feed and rest and sometimes to breed and nest. I’ve been observing the way shorebirds move, and have been drawing bird bones as a way to understand the internal structure of their ability to fly.  These sculptures are not literal, but are a visceral response to the question of flight.  I have created forms that will respond to the movement of wind.  The wind helps them come into full expression, and they in turn reveal elements of the nature of wind patterns. We think of birds as a symbol of freedom, when in fact most birds’ lives are anything but free.  They are tethered to seasons and cycles and the need for food.  A migratory bird in a cage will flap frantically in a northerly direction in the spring and a southerly direction in the fall.  Freedom for a bird may be freedom to follow its necessity. Fishing poles flying the bones add movement, and combined with the bones in the wind create a variable pathway of flight.  The poles also tether the bones to a place.  What is the tether that birds feel toward their destinations in Alaska, South America, a tiny island in the Caribbean?  Do we have similar magnetic forces that draw us toward a place?  What are the urges to move, to take flight, to be free, to be home?

These sculptures were built and flown during a time when I was returning to my mother’s home frequently to take care of her – it was not an obligation but a necessity for me.  I witnessed her freedom of spirit during a time when she returned to her bed often during the day and night, to rest.  Practice for the long sleep.  So the meaning of ‘tethered flight’ was layered at that time – what is freedom and what necessity calls us, and what is the dynamic flight that happens between them.