The Foyer Sculpture
Wall Panel in Mahogany and Forged Iron
created by Joseph O'Connell for
The First Unitarian Society
of Minneapolis
The wall panel of mahogany and forged iron in the foyer was created in accordance with the wish of Helen E. Blaisdell (1876 - 1974), who was for 72 years a member of the First Unitarian Society of Minneapolis. Miss Blaisdell provided in her will for the creation of an art work at the Unitarian meeting place that would express the essential spirit of Unitarian Universalism. The sculpture was designed and executed by Joseph O'Connell, and installed in March 1978.
Sculptor Joseph O'Connell was born in Chicago in 1927. He studied commercial art, but began working in sculpture in Mexico in 1950. He taught at Siena Heights College in Adrian Michigan, and at St. John's University in Collegeville, Minnesota. Since 1955 he has devoted all his time to sculpture, working in wood, metal, and stone. His work stands in a number of schools and churches, and he executed a large piece depicting a family group for the headquarters of the American Dental Association in Chicago. Joseph O'Connell died in 1995.
Panel 1 of the sculpture depicts the traditional Tree of Life. The foliage of the stylized tree is in four quadrants representing the four seasons; summer at the upper left, autumn at the lower left, winter at the lower right, and spring at the upper right. The roots of the tree probe downward into the earth for nourishment and moisture.
At the top of Panel 2 is a face, which may be male or female, wearing a look of deep thoughtfulness. Under the face a hand points downward, the fingers curved in an attitude of tenderness or of creation. At the bottom of the panel are the words of the ancient Hindu scriptures, the Rig Veda: "There is that by which the whole world is pervaded."
Panel 3 bears a series of faces, which may be men or women or children, or may be one face seen from a series of angles, from left-profile to full- face to right-profile. The faces are thoughtful; there is hope in them, but foreboding too; joy, but also sadness. They contemplate their world, meditating upon the wonder of life and the reality of beauty and goodness, but considering also the numberless ways in which these ideals are violated. They seem to contemplate both the nobility of humanity, and its debasement.
Panel 4, below these thoughtful heads, depicts suffering and mortality. Faces of wrought iron, skull-like and gaunt, are framed by tiny windows. Some of them seem to be weeping, screaming, or gagged. In the lower half of the panel is a corpse or skeleton, also of iron, wearing manacles. These figures evoke images of slave ships, or a concentration camp.
To the left of this horror, Panel 5 bears a sentence from the journal of Anne Frank, a Jewish girl who died at 14 in a Nazi concentration camp: "In spite of everything, I still believe that people are really good at heart." Against the dreadful reality next to it, these words affirm a continuing faith in the power and goodness of the human spirit. After reading these words, the viewer's eye is moved back to Panel 4, and the horizontal ridge which sweeps across it, leading upward to the human male figure with the phoenix held above his head.
Panel 6 bespeaks the power of human renewal, that can bring forth from death and suffering, symbolized by fire, a new birth of beauty and good. According to Middle Eastern legend, the phoenix is a bird of surpassing beauty, the only one of its kind. After living for 500-600 years, it burns itself in a funeral nest, from which it rises, fresh and beautiful, to renewed life.
Impressions of a Sculpture
David Friedman
It is bold and substantial, hard to miss. It has a certain presence, a purposefulness here. It marks this place as special, and it suggests, by its placement and its scale, that entering here is special, an event, significant. This a place of vision and of values, of culture and of art, a place of meaning and symbols.
A grouping of sections, six of them -separate, individual blocks that fit together in a composition. They are probably arranged deliberately - to tell a story by their relationships, their connections to each other. Or, they could be viewed as separate islands, each of unique, isolated significance, like chapters of a book or the movements of a symphony.
The hand of the carver, the artist, is evident. The surfaces are a terrain of textures, gouges and grooves, slopes and edges and dark wood beautifully stained and grained, with black elements, and text painted in bright colors...
I wonder, why is this man holding this bird up in his hands like this? Can't the bird fly? Is it tame? Is it a pet? Is it crippled?
The bird is Spirit, or Soul, or Essence... and the man is mankind, or Everyman, or each and every one of us, man and woman. And to be fully human, we must free our spirit, we must liberate our soul, we must realize our essence. And to do that we must act; take action, do, commit, create, intend.
The spirit does not take flight automatically; the soul does not ascend or transcend without effort. The artist does not give us the easy answer of a bird in flight, our spirits soaring, but presents us with a creative challenge. He shows us an image of the Unknown, of the moment of possibility, of potential, and he asks us a big question that only we can answer: Will I fly?
Graven Images
Rev. Kendyl Gibbons
We stand together before the Tree of Life and the pervading energy of creation, confronted by the sufferings of history and the assurance of death, with the ever-renewing potential for goodness and beauty in our outstretched hands. How can we together realize the fullness of this universe, embrace the astonishment of being alive; give flight, again and again, to the human spirit within us?
To live out the answers to these questions will keep us busy, I expect. The human project that calls us together is mystery and heart-break and grandeur enough; and how lucky we are, after all, to gather in the presence of this remarkable work of art, whose images invite us ever more deeply into that challenge and that truth.
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