Marrow Fragments

Janus's clay busts and masks are a selection from an ever-building memorial to those loved and lost on September llth and to those who stood watching, numb and helpless to explain or contain the tragedy.  Each sculpture represents an individual lost to violence, whether a direct victim or distant observer, and together the forms of the installation seek to foreground the personal response, in its vagaries and intricacies, as suggested by the details of varied bone structure, socket depth, musculature, and subtle expression.

The unfired stoneware forms (busts and masks) honour not only the individuality of the lost and grieving but also the fragility of life itself, a suggestion made more palpable during the performance of the installation wherein a bust is submerged in water, metaphorically given back to the elements, but also baptized by the love of the community of "souls" surrounding it.  Already, 18 of approximately l00 sculptures have been reclaimed by the water and formed anew.

The forms juxtapose the voyeurs, the mourners, the living and those lost, as they rest, suspended, waiting, watching, wondering---

communicating, it is hoped, a state of arrested meditation rather than alarm, to mirror the conviction that pain-filled memories do not have to be remembered as violent, but they do have to be faced.

Janus is now accepting images from those who have lost loved ones
to violent acts. 

Their image and memory will be included in this memorial.

janusart@hotmail.com