Artist Statement and Portfolio

Helen Evans Ramsaran

doi:10.1353/cal.2015.0008

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Artist Statement and Portfolio
Helen Evans Ramsaran (bio)

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Artist Statement

My work is an invitation to the viewer to accompany me on a long, complicated journey across the continent of Africa from prehistory to the present. My personal travels have taken me from Cairo to Cape Town and from Abidjan to Addis Ababa. My thirty-year love affair with Africa began in Nigeria in 1980, and I have returned over and over again. Trips were sometimes arduous, often joyous, but always insightful. In my discussions with African about the continent, I never shied away from its seemingly intractable problems, the internal tensions, the threat of drought and famine, and ravages of poverty. These were constantly on my mind, but I kept returning to Africa, because it is about so much more than that. The entire continent has such a rich history and culture, a variety of natural resources, rich eco-systems, warm, generous, resilient people, and an abundance of creativity. In my work, I invite the viewer to join me in gathering the threads of my/ our human history as I try to weave my own personal narrative from this rich source.

Africa, in all of its complexity and beauty, has been a deep well of inspiration to me and for my work. I create both large and small-scale bronze sculptures. Over the years, I have worked in various materials, clay, cast paper, plaster, and resin, but I keep returning to bronze. Bronze, like Africa, has a timeless quality much like the Benin bronzes that once adorned the Royal Court of Benin in West Africa.

I use the lost wax process of casting my sculptures in bronze. In other words, I create the sculptures first in wax or some other material and later cast them in bronze. Since wax is so versatile, I generally work directly with it. When wax is hot, I sometimes pour it on a cold, damp surface to create a roiling, bubbly surface similar to those surfaces that I observed on the facades of some indigenous architecture. When the wax is warm, I can model it creating soft undulating surfaces like desert sands or intricate forms like birds’ feet. When the wax is cold, I carve into it creating rich texture that suggests the grainy surface of aged wood. All of these complex textures and surfaces are captured in the sculptures when they are cast in bronze later. [End Page 96]