Description of an Unveiling: |
P.A. Arts Centre - June 19/94
Unveiling of
bronze bust, John V. Hicks
- (after inspecting bust)
I think this
must be the one occasion when I can be properly referred to... as ... the
real thing!
Ladies and Gentlemen
Sixteen years ago,
almost to the day, the City of Prince Albert--I have reason to believe at the
instigation of the founding father of this great arts facility, Joe Oliver,
then City Commissioner... the City was gracious enough to name me
Writer-in-residence--an ongoing and honorary title carrying no very active
obligations. The citation, signed by the Mayor, Mac Pereverzoff, still hangs on
my wall. And here, sixteen years later, I am again marshalled.
If
nothing quite like this has ever happened to you, you can have no idea of the
import of this evening's ceremony--to have reached a point in the long safari
where you may be expected to be about ready to pack it in, only to find that
there are people who would like to keep you on hand a while longer--a while, in
this case, suggesting, to all intents and purposes, forever.
To be
remembered is one thing, and a pleasant one. To be cast in an imperishable
metal, which neither moth nor rust can corrupt, is quite another. A kind of
secular immortality; and above all humbling experience indeed.
Forever,
I said...unless, of course, in a far and future era, some pagan society might
elect to melt you down into ear-rings or wristlets or shoe buckles . . .not, it
is to be hoped, into instruments of war--dagger hilts, spear points...a bit
unsettling to think of being thrust through the heart of a politically
designated foe, without so much as a chance to murmur, no offence...
I'm fantasizing. I'm sorry. Writer-in-residence indeed!
One day last
year--I think it must have been summer, the way time flies, George Glenn
appeared in the doorway of the Arts Centre kitchen, wearing his serious
expression No. 3A; and instead of blurting out, "Jack. is there any tea?" he
said, "There's something I have to talk to you about. A long pause, to allow my
reactions to assemble themselves. He said, "Some of us have a project in mind,
and we need your permission before going ahead with it. We wondered if you
would consider sitting..." And my flesh began to crawl. I had a flash vision of
one of George's painting classes ranged before me, brushes and palletes at the
ready, down about this angle
 and I
myself elevated at a similar angle
 and
perhaps the ever-meticulous Peggy Kerr, standing to one side, waiting for me to
hand her, piece by piece, my clothes. But George was still speaking, and he
went on to say that the sitting he had in mind was a sitting for a bust--a
bronze bust. Well at least my consternation was at once cut in half, shall we
say...yes, at the waist...and after a settling-down moment my first reaction
was, Why Me? I was sure the City was littered with artistic people more
deserving of such an honour than I. But when George has an idea it doesn't
dislodge easily, as many of you know. His outward calm becomes a blank wall
against which not a few sharp objections have blunted. And before I knew it I
was, if not agreeing, at least admitting that I could hardly say NO.
The
setting for my execution--the word has two senses, and I use the more
applicable one--the setting was to be George's studio, which occupies the
basement of the Daily Herald building--a commodious and sprawling expanse that
I won't try to describe--you have to see it to believe it--and it was there l
met sculptor Hans Holtkamp, who fast became both a friend and an influence in
my life. I must tell you that Hans knows a traditional saying, "Y'ain't much if
y'ain't Dutch." Don't leave this evening before you meet Hans Holtkamp in
person. He is both Dutch and much.
Well, any thought I may have had
about a "sitting" being a tedious affair was soon dispelled. I am, of course,
afflicted with a propensity for meditation, but even so the hours flew by, and
my thoughts with them, coffee breaks and breaks for lunch included, stretching
out into at least two days. I was seated in a not uncomfortable chair, at one
side of a small table, and on the table a square piece of board, with a short
standard rising from it at an angle, resembling a length of two-by-two lumber,
which, I guess it may well have been. Across from me sat Hans, on a low
backless chair on casters, on which he would soon be swivelling and charging
about on the concrete floor, not unlike a startled animal trying to decide
where to leap, sizing me up, making decisions, putting me into his artistic
perspective. Beside him he he had a pail of specially prepared plasticine, of
his own compounding, and one of his first moves was to seize a huge handful of
the stuff and smack it onto the projecting end of the standard. My head, in
embrio. Another handful, and another.
Then, somewhere overhead, the
Herald presses began to whirr and gather speed, and I thought they were telling
the world that I was here, in process of being preserved. That rhythmic,
strangely singing sound will stay with me always. I have heard it several times
since, and the music is always the same.
So there was Hans, fingering
and thumbing at my beginnings, starting to recreate me with the aid of small
wooden paddles, and more delicate tools not unlike a dentist's instruments. I
was in due course callipered, the thickness of my head assessed (the physical
thickness, in case you're wondering) distance from brow to chin, comparison of
distance between the eyes to length of nose, chin to lip, measurement of ears,
all sorts of statistics the sculptor must take into account. Look down to the
floor, he'd say, now look up to that window, turn your head slightly to the
left, now to the right, and so on as daylight began to change and one day look
forward to another. At one point he said, "Now will you look directly at me."
And as I met his gaze in full I thought this man knows more about me than I
know myself.
Finally, my plasticine likeness, right down to the
necktie's knot, was there before us, and the thing seemed alive, so real was
it. Hans said, "When you see it in the finished bronze it will really come
alive. The only further feature I could think of was that the thing would
speak. So let me ask you, if you should want to inspect my replica at close
range, to be careful what you say. It might be repeated.
I mustn't keep
you too long, telling you how my newborn self was trucked off to Saskatoon,
there to be coated with a film of rubber, provided with a shell involving a
type of wax, and the dangerous pouring of the molten metal begun. Dangerous,
because as I understand the founder has to be protectively clothed, since a
single spatter from that fierce burning river, falling on his skin, would eat
right through him.
Well, the mission is accomplished, and here we are, I
and ME--the one charged with the responsibility of conveying me quietly into
history. And I am faced with the need to express my most sincere thanks to
everyone who had anything to do with the project, to all who saw fit to support
it. For this, no words I can think of would be adequate. A plain THANKYOU will
have to suffice. I reported that sense of humbleness, when I began. I know, in
my secret self, that I am of small account. That all this splendid gesture of
goodwill can not be fully deserved. All my confreres in the practice of the
holy arts, working in whatever medium know that humbleness is the true, the
real thing.
Many years ago on another festive occasion, I put the
feeling into a few lines which later appeared in one of the early issues of
Saskatchewan's literary journal, GRAIN, a journal which has since gained
international circulation. And here, having a contained audience, I think I'll
close by repeating them. The piece is called COME BACK ALWAYS.
From
instruments and ceremonial marches,
tape showers, formal
commendations,
tumults, acceptances,
from flights of song,
dancing,
merriment in the streets,
laughter like bells, the peal
of
glad opinion, the spun glory,
I come back always to the bare
room,
silent save for the creaking chair,
deserted but for the gaunt
figure,
who rocks, lip curled; who rises, brews bitter tea, breaks bread,
shuffles toward me, watches me
shrink to the focus of an eye.
Ladies
and Gentlemen...thank you... very much! |
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