Liège/Luik Cathédrale St Paul

 

Green Man, Leaf Mask or Feuillou


www.gafpa.nl

Green Men in Maastricht

Heads-with-leaves
a.k.a. foliage grotesque

Dominicanerkerk


Badly damaged Green Man


St. Servaaskerk


www.gafpa.nl

Green Men and Women

All of a sudden, they start appearing. How come I never spotted all those Green Men before?

Green Pair in Rotterdam


Green Man in the making


My Green Men [and Women]

to be continued and updated...

Links:

Wikipedia

Green men in the Netherlands

Heads- with-leaves

Green Man East Anglia

Susanna Duffy

Green Man Canterbury



www.gafpa.nl

Matthaüs Passion

Both familiar and ever new, St. Matthew Passion is a major event in the cycle of the year. Good for contemplation, very inspiring. The altus of the opening chorale "O Lamm Gottes" sang with an intensity that worked like gilding on a Russian Icon, or on a medieval polychrome statuette. It gave me goosebumps.

I noticed a Green Man carved in the church benches.



Vegetation Spirit-oncoming resurrection-how fitting.


Fraser-Golden Bough
Holland boys Choir - Pieter Jan Leusink
Martinikerk Groningen
Matthaüs Passion


www.gafpa.nl

Wheel of fortune - still that Wheel

Roue de Fortune - Roue à carrillons.
First seen in Koñforzh-Meilar a.k.a. Confort-Meil(l)ars, Finistère/Breizh in 2007

click here for Youtube clip

And then there's Marcel Duchamp's Roue de Bicyclette, of course.

Just a temporary gadget which I made today. I added bells but they can hardly be heard or seen in the clip. The neighbouring children kept moving the Wheel all afternoon, though.


www.gafpa.nl

Light in his eyes

Today I made the black in his eyes blacker


And if you look from the right angle you will notice that I also made the light lighter



He's getting more and more iconic.



Nerukotvornyi


The dripping blood our only drink,
The bloody flesh our only food:
In spite of which we like to think
That we are sound, substantial flesh and blood—
Again, in spite of that, we call this Friday good.
TS Eliot - East Coker



www.gafpa.nl

Green eyes

 

I just can't help associating my Green Man with the oncoming Resurrection. This week..
whan Zephyrus eek with his sweete breeth
inspired hath in every holt and heeth
the tendre croppes...

To me it is just wonderful, adding eyes to a face, to the music of Bach's Matthäus Passion. It's the Man coming around

He knows.



www.gafpa.nl

Green Man on Tree Trunk

What are the roots that cluch, what branches grow
out of this stony rubbish? Son of man,
you cannot say, or guess, for you know only
a heap of broken images, where the sun beats,
and the dead tree gives no shelter
TWL


The stand which I -rather unexpectedly- finished today

...and here's the Wheel


As all the spokes of the wheel are contained in the nave and the circumference, all things are contained in this Self - Atman
[Brhad-Aranyaka Upanisad II-5:15]


The Mask of the Man is now nearing completion on its tree-stand.
(The leaves still need some finishing)


Click label W092 for a history of this work.
(And for an overview of all the associations which I had while carving.



www.gafpa.nl

Ararat

Yet another association

Top view:



The weather was much better today


www.gafpa.nl

Hard as stone...

I am still struggling with the piece of tropical hardwood that is going to be the stand. It is really hard to handle and difficult to carve. Its grain is interlocked and splinters feel really poisonous.

I want it to be like a tree trunk and I want it at the same time to be like the nave of a wheel - with broken off spokes.
The idea came to me on seeing a picture of the driving wheels from GWR King Edward II at Didcot.

More about GWR 6023 King Edward II



www.gafpa.nl

green man

With horns from cuckoo-clock weights.
Work has started on what is to be a treetrunk-like stand

www.gafpa.nl

New tool

Me playing with my new toy. Yes, I am left-handed -but then,
I 've got two left hands!

www.gafpa.nl

Man of the woods

Now complete with
Nose (chestnut leaf)
Crown (beech leaves)
Moustach (oak leaves)
Left ear in progress (laurel)
Eyebrows roughed out (spruce twigs)
Lips shaped today

Man of the Woods

Beech
Now complete with
Nose (chestnut leaf)
Crown (beech leaves)
Moustach (oak leaves)
Left ear in progress (laurel)
Eyebrows roughed out (spruce twigs)
Lips shaped today

Minus Horns(Cuckooclock weights) and treetrunk-shaped stand

www.gafpa.nl

When the Man comes around

He's starting to get Messiah-like overtones, my Man of the Woods.
What's he up to?
And I heard, as it were, the noise of thunder: One of the four beasts saying: "Come and see"

DA Datta Dayadhvam Damyata

Man of the Woods

Uath? Enkidu? The Green Knight?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_man

Man of the Woods

AKA Green Man
Uath
Woodwose

[Early version 1995]

Try-outs:

[Sketch 24-10-2008]

[Autumn leaves 2008]

Beech log - Cuckoo clock weights - pipe cuttings