Gall's Bust IV, A Study in Winter 2010

Editor: This is Fiona Pardington's "Gall's Bust IV, A Study in Winter," created in 2010. It's a marble sculpture overlaid with charcoal markings. It gives me the shivers, like peering into a forgotten corner of medical history, a ghostly map of the mind etched onto cold stone. What secrets do you think it's holding? Curator: Oh, secrets galore, I imagine! But I think it's more about the *search* for secrets. This bust references phrenology, that old pseudoscience of mapping personality onto the skull. Think about that: the impulse to quantify the unquantifiable, to box up the unruly mess of human nature. Pardington gives us a beautiful, haunting object, but it's one built on a pretty flawed premise. What does that contrast spark for you? Editor: I see what you mean about boxing up human nature. I guess I feel a tension between the cool, almost clinical aspect and the very human face, like a life study or death mask. Is it right to impose those ideas onto it? Curator: Ah, the beauty of art – it’s inherently an imposition, isn't it? But a thought-provoking one, I hope. Pardington often explores themes of mortality and memory, so this could be her way of questioning those boundaries. Plus, that weathered marble suggests a certain passage of time... Doesn’t that invite us to consider the ephemerality of our own attempts at understanding? Editor: I think so. The more I look, the less certain I am about… well, almost everything. I initially saw coldness, but now I see fragility, too. Thanks for helping me tease that out. Curator: The pleasure is all mine! Now I might have to get it as the new design of my gravestone… No! Maybe not... Just kidding. Let's move on to the next fascinating enigma then.