The Brothers Breton is a 27" bronze statuette done as an homage to Malvina Hoffman's original 'The Breton Wrestlers' and was commissioned by Christopher D'Anna.
My youngest brother Farrell and I stood in as the models for the reference photos from which I sculpted (the photos are taken by my girlfriend, Elizabeth Kennamer).This modeling session was done the weekend of my father's sudden death from cancer surgery (Jan 2nd, 2009) in Northern Maine. It was an incredibly strenuous, ancient, awkward and hilarious exercise to capture and hold the gesture (well rehearsed in boxers first!). One might think this activity should have been postponed but it was somehow an appropriate, and even necessary thing to do amidst the shock and grief. I had been planning a trip to Maine for several months to visit my family, be with my father while he convalesced, and make this photo shoot. What was I to do? Isn't it true that only art and family triumph in the face of death?
This piece has naturally taken on a deep significance even though my brother and I, having had the correct physiques, were only playing a part for the sake of a pre-determined project, like the clay or bronze itself. During the following months while I completed the commission, I had the very strange, parallel experience as both a deeply grieving son and detached artisan observing and partaking in a creative process that had nothing and everything to do with the loss. My father's presence was intensified by the fact that I had inherited all of his paints, easels and brushes, which then surrounded me in my studio. I am not entirely capable of nor willing to describe how this sculpture expresses my relationship to my father. My job was to make the piece.
Had my father not died, what then would the sculpture mean? What can it mean to a stranger as it is?
Or as my brother joked "What the hell are those boys up to ?!!"
It is about masculinity, the struggle of mortality in the turn of time and the eternal rescue and fratricide of the collective and solitary 'self'.
In the end, It is about an older, heavier male about to slam his younger opponent on his head.
Coincidentally, the patron of this work had originally hoped to replace a long lost copy of Hoffman's 'Wrestlers' that was once owned by his own father. "The Brothers Breton" now sits by his fire place.
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