M.L. SNOWDEN ART
THE ARTIST
A Word about the Geological Coreium
Since 1998, The Geological Coreium has encompassed, connected and illuminated Snowden’s vision for sculpture. The Geological Coreium is a neologism that was coined by Snowden to describe the geological centrality of earthly physical phenomena that also projects and echoes into the matrix of interstellar phenomena. Snowden’s bronzes celebrate titanic geological forces and energies that occur on earthly and universal planes.
In carrying out her vision, Snowden has created chapters of bronze that evoke the Hydrosphere, the Atmosphere, the planetary plane of rocks and soils in the Terrestrial Forum, as well as more abstract concepts that impact the geological profile of matter. Such works comprise a range of sculptural chapters including the Foundations of Synergy. In all, The Geological Coreium is an unfolding oeuvre that has been built across more than ten chapters that celebrate physical scientific phenomena seen through a humanitarian lens. Snowden’s oeuvre is comprised of upwards of a hundred designs that have been explicated in more than 2,000 bronzes that are currently held in public and private collections worldwide.
[1] The Legacy of Rodin Film, VB Nova Associates 1999
[1] Contemporary American Sculpture. New York, The Kalkhoff Company, 1929; Archives of the National Sculpture Society, New York; Ludovic Baschet. Societe Des Artistes Francais: Catalogue Illustre Du Salon de 1907, 125 Exposition Rodin Grand Jury – 1905, 1906, 1907. P. 5; Eberhard, p. 285. .Paris, Bibliotheque Des Annales 51 Rue Saint-Georges, 1907.
A Fusion of Message and Medium
For Snowden, The Geological Coreium constitutes a profound revelation - one in which the natural geologic mediums of sculpture have become fused to shaping naturally occurring geologic forms that reside in clay and bronze. Indeed, in Snowden’s art, the message is the medium. Snowden is one of the few figurateurs to exploit the essential fusion that exists between the physical hand of the artist and the materials which describe humanitarian geological form. In Snowden’s view, there is a great unification of connection in a work such as Sea Creates, where Snowden observes her own human blood to be composed of some of the same minerals and elements as her bronze as well as sea water: as Snowden remarks, “From microcosm to macrocosm, bronze celebrates unified octaves of the physical universe.”
The Private Window of the Geological Coreium
As Snowden relates, “Actually I make my sculpture to fill the void of how I hunger to see bronze. In my work, I’m not seeking to make, evoke or commemorate something. It’s not an illustrative or programmatic art. In looking to my clay and bronze, the work is a formation of its own geologic material.” As Snowden continues, “My art is an intuitive process. For instance, in compressing clay, I didn’t set out to “make” a Sea Fan. Rather, a “Y” shape was rising up through the lines of a figure that was floating towards me in the clay I was working on. Sea Fans are “Y” shaped silt beds that occur when fresh water rivers meet the sea. My sculptures are always named and more fully discovered after they’re created in the clay; my clay argille that I import that is a condensed colloidal suspension of quartz crystals; an efficient energy transducer. Observers of my work also add to a work’s interpretation, constantly seeing vistas and new interpretations within the bronze.”
A Further Insight
As Snowden remarks, “I tend to remember that the bronze metal medium has the capacity to out-live the cultures that have worked in it. So, my bronzes tend to bypass temporal cultural subjects. The works of the Coreium exist more as an eternal planetary language. I think it’s a language that is naturally spoken through a humanitarian core. The figures are essential to it. Although there are plenty of words that have been written about it, an onlooker doesn’t need to know anything about the title or geological basis of my work to connect with it. Actually, the work is larger than what I can say about it." As one critic observed, “Yes, viewers optically perceive Snowden’s sculpture but they emotionally feel it, and they touch it physically, gaining a connection into the material’s natural vitality and electrical healing charge.”
Sculpture as a Source of Connection
At another juncture, Snowden remarked that “Humankind is at the center of these earth materials. Our Earth gives rise to our physicality. We’re naturally in this clay and bronze matrix which is our geological home. Our bodies and these materials all share the same elements; we’re just arranged differently.” Snowden further commented, “When you look closely, these basic forms of my sculpture are all ‘S’ curves that mirror the structure of light. Dali’s line and ball lesson that he gave to me is transformed, where I now see form in terms of the structure of light which is essentially a wave or the creation of a particle. When I think of light, human anatomical structure, and my mediums, I really think my bronze art is a shingle off the roof of the cosmos. The great project of sculpture conveys that humankind is not dislocated from the cosmic powers that continually shape us. I guess another way to say it is that on a deeply personal level, my art asserts we’re never separated from love or light. Set into the crux of making sculpture all these years, I’ve come to believe that the universe eternally embraces its essential resources.”[1]
[1] Lisa Crawford Watson. “Force Field: M.L. Snowden Frees Figures from Clay with a Legendary Sculptor’s Tools” September Issue, Art and Antiques Magazine 2000
Rodin’s Tools: Shaping a Sculptural Legacy
Inheriting Rodin’s tools on her father’s death in 1990, today Snowden uses select instruments from the collection in creating her own spectacular works. As Snowden observes, “The tools are a continuing source of inspiration. When I comb the tools over clay or use Rodin’s Paris chasing tool on bronze, I can feel deep and dazzling energies. From the beginning, my art was a way to clothe my way forward into healing. Today, it speaks of transformation. Rodin’s tools literally sizzle with connections that bind the past to the present. And they shape the future of sculpture that others will see in distant times. Each tool is a key that unlocks indescribable passages in my material, where every new work creates a new voice.” [1]
[1]Snowden Archives Interview, edit.; Dr. David Rosen. M.L. Snowden: The Rodin Tools/Reflections on a Sculptural Heritage, Posidonos Books, 2006