Breathing life into steel
Sculptor known for his human figures in his artwork
George Wallace’s art embraced life, death and everything in between.
Wallace (1920-2009) immigrated to Canada from his native Ireland in the late 1950s and became a leading Hamilton artist.
He taught for 25 years at McMaster University, where I was one of his many students. On retirement, he moved to Victoria, where he continued to work as a sculptor and printmaker.
He specialized in the human figure, taking inspiration from the Bible, classical mythology and ordinary life.
Prints, drawings and two welded steel sculptures are on show in Darkness, Remembrance and Light, a mini-retrospective exhibition in three parts, or themes, at the Carnegie Gallery in Dundas.
Darkness is one of the themes. The sculptures and works on paper exploring this were inspired by biblical imagery and were intended by Wallace to be comments on contemporary life.
Wallace often explored the same narrative more than once. Peter and the rooster is one such story. Lazarus is another.
In the New Testament account, Christ raises Lazarus from the dead. This miracle looks ahead to Christ’s resurrection. Lazarus’s story was very popular with the earliest Christian artists almost 2,000 years ago.
Lazarus is the subject of both sculptures in this exhibition. Both were made in Wallace’s Dundas studio.
Wallace not only fabricates a dead man coming to life, but as a sculptor, he breathes life into steel. Wallace especially relished all the welding involved.
“Lazarus Risen from the Dead” is a free-standing, slightly over lifesize sculpture. Wallace captures Lazarus at a moment when he begins to free himself from the winding sheets he was buried in.
Head flung back, arms raised and extended, Lazarus exudes a force so profound that some of the bright orange sheets have split.
The emphatic gesture of Lazarus’s arms is multi-functional. It looks joyful and life-embracing. It moves him into our space, so we become witnesses to this miraculous moment. And he looks like he’s almost ready to fly.
But at the same time, both of his feet are immobile and planted firmly on the ground. Will he manage to set himself free? In other words, can he escape death?
Moreover, Lazarus’s raised arms recall Christ on the cross and point to both Christ’s — and Lazarus’s — death.
Wallace’s other “Lazarus” has his winding sheets wrapped tightly around his body, making him look simplified, compact — and less alive.
Only his raised face and hands are exposed. The hands look flayed and decayed, a reminder of death.
Lazarus holds one hand in front of his body. The other you have to walk around to find: it’s in the back.
The second theme in this exhibition, Remembrance, contains prints inspired by the landscape of St. Austell in southwestern England. Wallace treats the landscape and its clay pits in an abstract style.
The third theme, Light, deals with ordinary life.
The prints are lighthearted but, in true Wallace fashion, tinged with sarcasm.
Many of the prints feature people watching television. The screens show couples kissing. The lonely television viewers are not engaged in similar loving embraces.
Wallace is fair, however, when it comes to ridicule. In “Self Portrait with Dark Glasses”, for instance, his lenses reflect two kissing couples.
Regina Haggo is teaching Carved in Stone, a nine-week course about how sculptors have created some of art history’s most significant works. You can sign up for Monday or Friday afternoon classes. Classes start on Monday, Sept. 25 and Friday, Sept. 29. To register, phone the Dundas Valley School of Art, 905-628-6357, or go to dvsa.ca. dhaggo@thespec.com