Artist Statement

DShK is the acronym for “Degtyaryova-Shpagina Krupnokaliberny” the name of a Russian made heavy machine gun invented in the 1930’s. It’s nicknamed Dushka- an abbreviation for the gun – which means “sweetie” as a term of endearment. The polychrome fiberglass figure called Dushka, part of the resent DShK exhibition in Cape Town, implies a complex and reciprocal relationship between its sculptural form and the colour enhancing it. Modified into a mutual dependency, the tendency of colour to mask, by this enhancement instead reveals the deeper concern of the assembled construct of fibreglass and steel. My work is about the darker side of sexuality and the gradient scale of existing parity and inequality. It is also about the celebration of form, balance, the challenges of construction, and the materials bringing to developing concepts, an understanding and a multi-dimensional approach.While linked to the collective consciousness and the present, through the process of sculpting and constant acquisition of technical skills, a resolution is arrived at, a process as much part of the physicality of the work, as it is the own responsive immersion into memory and experience, to construct a contemporary consciousness. Thus, in the case of the referenced figure, in the complex accumulation of materials and emotive content, the arrangement with the brutal steel mechanism and the beauty of form and rational rhythm, shows the dichotomy between traditionally accepted values and violence, in which the tragi-comic figure illustrates the issues addressed. The objective is to evoke an emotional response, a calculated discomfort, a deceiv- ingly easy invite, all the while making the viewer aware of the complete process of the work, from the very first motivational response, to the last mark, keeping its immediacy, its currency and relevance, its history

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