Beyond the mural and ceramics, Joy Brown stands strong as a major sculptor in the United States and Japan.
Update on a documentary ilm in progress - For a while now, we have consistently posted updates on the progress of One World, the fifty-foot-long mural commissioned by a private collector in Japan. The mural is a massive mosaic of rectangular plates baked on Joy's anagama kiln in Kent, Connecticut, and soon to be installed on a wall facing the Pacific Ocean on the island of Amami Oshima, Japan.
The fascination with the mural was such that we neglected to shift the lens and focus of the documentary film on Joy Brown to the monumental figures for which she's better known. Nine of these figures intruded into the public space in New York for the first in the exhibit organized by the Broadway Mall Association in cooperation with the New York City Department of Parks & Recreation.
While I was busy documenting Joy's progress with her mural in Connecticut, artisans in Shanghai completed the cast of the most recent larger-than-life sculptures. The figures arrived from China today, and if everything goes as planned, the artist will be working on the patina and other finishing in a designated workshop upstate New York.
I plan to be there in about a week to document these final touches, which, as I understand, include the opening of the eyes of these extraordinary figures. Who are they? Does it matter? They seem to be multiracial, embraceable, powerful, all observing, men and women, and everything in between the binary alternatives. I've seen these monuments in public parks, and children and the not-so-young playing with them and sometimes riding on their backs. I know a few of the newly arrived are going into private collections, and I wish others would populate the public space to the delight of millions.
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