Kevin Dagg

Decay

Kevin DaggDecayOutline Description

Selected through open submission ‘Decay’ was an exhibition of two Scottish and two Dutch artists for the Patriothall Gallery, Edinburgh. Included as part of the Edinburgh Art Festival the exhibition was a collection of work from each artist based around the theme of ‘Decay’. ‘Uh, Oh’ was an installation in the main gallery space which incorporated carved elements into the constructed scenario of a devastated landscape.

Kevin DaggDecay

The figure of a large doll carved from wood sits abandoned in a forest of bare pine trees. She has lost a leg but appears unduly concerned by her predicament as if waiting for someone to return with the missing limb. The abandoned doll is regularly used in reportage as a metaphor for the loss of innocent life and the photographer often uses foreshortening to distort the scale and increase the emotive impact. The installation employs a similar distortion of scale by enlarging the figure of the doll and using juvenile trees for the forest. The resulting image is more like a dreamlike scenario of disturbing relationships and implied narratives.

Kevin DaggDecay

Carving demonstration at the Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop as part of their open day. Demonstration explaining the techniques employed in carving the various elements of the doll.

Kevin DaggDecay

The head of the doll was hand carved from solid cherry wood and in order to create a more naturalistic effect it is a portrait of my daughter.

The left hand of the doll is in the position of a basic Mudra which is a spiritual gesture commonly used in Hinduism and Buddhism. The right hand is held in the sign of the benediction.

‘Stress Position’ is a sculpture of an Iraqi prisoner being softened up by American soldiers at the Abu Garaib prison. The original newspaper image has become synonymous with the prisoner abuse scandal and was chosen as an unromanticised vision of abuse and the physical impact on the human body. Modeled from wax and then cast into bronze the figure was intended as a maquette for a much larger wood carving. The bronze figure was finished with a spraying technique developed by myself to replicate the colour separations of the original newspaper image. Cyan, magenta, yellow and black were the four colours applied in succession via a mouth spray. This primitive spaying technique was chosen instead of utilising air compressors to produce a rudimentary effect which revealed the process. The technique is also reminiscent of the technique employed to produce the earliest cave paintings. As far as I am aware this is technique is unique on 3 dimensional work.

The sculpture was first exhibited at the Society of Scottish Artists annual exhibition in the Royal Scottish Academy where it was awarded the SSA first prize by the artistic committee.

Kevin Dagg Decay

The third piece was a drawing depicting the beheading of Nick Berg by Iraqi insurgents. This image was extracted from the first, of several carefully orchestrated videos. A blurry video still was widely circulated in the international press and the in the image a figure can be seen to read from a prepared statement as a the central figure draws a large knife from his jacket. In the drawing the picture has been enlarged so the figures are represented life-size and the viewer is forced to experience the image in a highly confrontational way. However, removed from the original context it is difficult to bring the image and the significance into focus but gradually the detail and true horror start to unfold.

Kevin DaggDecay

Installing the Beheading in the gallery space. The drawing was produced using children's wax crayons and this was my first attempt to reproduce the colour quality of the newspaper image. The colours are applied in layers and then an eraser is used to blend the colours on the paper and blur the drawing to replicate the quality of the original image.