What you will see in the pages to follow is a substantial sampling of sculptures I've done over the past 15-18 years. This is not to say that I was not doing sculpture prior to this time, only that it was about this time that I began to conceive of myself self-consciously as a "sculptor," and began then to get some of the works cataloged through pictures. In the Biography section, and elsewhere, I make references to sculptural works going back to boyhood. Incredibly, I still have a few of these.

The neat catalog of photos in this portfolio may give the impression that sculpture has throughout the period been my sole interest. This is far from the case, as one might expect. In fact, I have often thought of sculpture as a "recessive gene," in my personality, rather than a dominant one, since I was for a long time uncertain of my abilities in the "visual arts," convinced that I was ultimately fated to be a "writer." Breaking loose from this assumption is to a degree the story of my liberation from comfortable habits of mind and is reflected in the pendulum swings toward, and away from the cosmology of belief issuing from the Apostle John: "in the beginning was the Word." I have hope in the process of reconciliation, blending both Word and Substance through sculpture and storytelling. Furthermore, as we all know, "Life" has a way of intruding upon our intentions, so it is best to consider the sculptures to follow as if they were islands in the stream of the affairs which have been my life so far. I might have wished for a life whose circumstances allowed for many such islands, spacious and beneficent, dotting a placid and sunlit stream; then again, I must believe that in the end the stream is more important and more lasting than the islands, and that the sculptures are more like boats, in which I am able to float for a time. Some of these boats I still have, some have been given away, some sold, some long since broken and gone.

What this portfolio does represent, for me, is work. Sometimes labored, sometimes effortless. Carving Ancestor Tree, a 30' standing Ash tree, top to bottom, by myself, was an incredible amount of work. Just moving the scaffolding, over and over again, was a job. But I never minded. Physical labor can be restful, and put to the service of "artistic creation," positively uplifting. No, I refer to the internal labor required to "pull" an idea completely through the process of translation from conception to manifestation in physical reality. Sometimes, this process may take years, with the sculpture "stalled" for periods of days, weeks, months, or even years at any number of stages. Queen of the Seas, is probably about eight years old, and is now in its fourth stage (a stage brought on by attic heat, which melted the clay and caused the Queen to fall from her cross). This internal labor is not related necessarily to size, either. Dreaming Fairie began as a little piece I could hold in my hand, which eventually I adapted to an organic form on a stalk, which in time I tried to mold, and failed, and had to begin all over again on a larger scale, minus the stalk and form, which then I had molded, a couple of times in resin, but the molder went out of business, so I ended up starting all over with a new mold, which I did myself, with less success and thus with considerable post-mold mending. You get the picture. And if you are a sculptor, I'm sure you know exactly what I'm talking about, and have your own examples

From time to time, I ask myself, why? Why do I do this? An answer is not always forthcoming, and if it does come forth, even a good answer may lack the requisite emotional "umph" for actually creating sculpture. In the end, though, motivation to sculpture has something to do with leaving one's mark in the world, with erecting a cairn or scratching a signpost that reads in effect, "In this place and my time, I made what you see here. Do you like it?" Sculpture also affords the chance to turn the tables on the often unavoidable conviction that Destiny (or fate, or culture, or family, or genes--whatever word works for you) is the Sculptor, and we the helpless clay. Instead, we manage at times to do the shaping, from materials of our own choosing, toward purposes we may hope to achieve.What a kick! The action may even bring the fulfillment of metaphor, worthy of consideration.

Put another way, sculpture gives me a constructive means of responding to events in the world which are beyond my control. After the mind-numbing tragedy of 9/11, I plunged gratefully into developing a proposal for the Fallen Officer Memorial, because this project allowed me the chance to transfer the fears and anxieties from that period of national angst into a sculpture shaped to convey a message of "Ministry and Kinship." In the same way, the Blacksburg "Peace Pole" project (I am carving icons of the sea, a dove, a tree, and the moon on a four sided pole carrying the words "May Peace Prevail On Earth") enabled me to move beyond the frustration and anger I felt in opposition to the invasion of Iraq, toward the hope of ultimate reconciliation.

These ruminations aside, sculpture is in the end, at its best, a meditation, with no need of reasons why; deeply-felt rapport in the shaping of what is, and is not oneself, simultaneously, is pleasure enough.