Pelvis

Elm, 31" x 19" x 19"

Santa Clara, CA

This piece was destined to be light and airy because most of the log was decayed, leaving a shell of mostly sapwood. I think the reason for the decay was pruning of the top of the main trunk 25 years before the tree was finally cut down. This aspect of the tree’s history can be deduced by counting the growth rings around the hole at the top of the sculpture where the tree tried to grow over the cut trunk. Out of this regrowth were six small branches that the arborist left as stubs when cutting the tree down. The challenge for this sculpture was in choosing the vertical connections between the top and the base. I chose to not retain a strip of bark running down each vertical rib because it appeared too bulky; rather, I chose to leave the last of the undecayed wood adjacent to the rotten center of the log. If you turn the sculpture upside down and look up the “core,” you will have a better feel for what the original log looked like.