Sittin’ Pretty

Patrick Dougherty,  1996

Photo Gallery

Artist Statement

Built in Rome in 1502 and described as the essence of Renaissance architecture, Donato Bramante’s Tempietto provided a compelling point of departure for me in designing a sculpture for the South Carolina Botanical Garden. Planned with the rationality of mathematics, the Tempietto’s circular configuration was imagined by the sixteenth century viewer as almost a spinning form, the wall of which seemed “shapable and pliant” in the Italian sunlight.

Such a description prompted me to imagine a sculpture which might mix the tradition of great architecture with the simple construction methods of a backyard bird’s nest. I envisioned Bramanate’s dignified classical form rendered not in stone, but entirely from recycled prunings gathered near the Botanical Garden. I could see something stately and referential, and yet a sapling structure with a surface that suggested the momentum and speeding lines of some impromptu natural phenomena.

When I discovered that the height to width ration of the Tempietto’s central barrel is identical to the proportions of many of the mature shrubs in the Botanical Garden, I wondered if Bramante had really discovered the secret of his building’s pleasing proportion by walking in his own Roman garden. Given the grand inspiration for the sculpture and its Southern hometown setting, this little Tempietto, rendered in local tree limbs and branches, really seemed to be Sittin’ Pretty.-Patrick Dougherty, 1996

OBSERVATIONS

“The smaller trees’ branches were intertwined with one another like a circle of trust.”-Earle

“Patrick Dougherty’s sculptures take the shape of long, meandering snakes or strictly patterned bundles of woven maple saplings.”-Nicholas Drake

“I imagined that the inclusion of living trees might increase the sculpture longevity as well as provide a recognizable trace of the sculpture, once the original sapling materials had wasted away.”-Patrick Dougherty

“Dougherty’s work consists of a unique intertwining of hardwood saplings to create a large free-   forming gestural sculpture. Resembling the work of birds, his sculptures are often questioned as to whether man’s hand has intervened.”

“[Patrick Dougherty] was able to weave together not only the various sizes and colors of maple and dogwood saplings, but the veins of movement, thought and feeling within the human organism and between an individual and the universe beyond.”

“Within the walls are living maple trees which are indeed rooted in the earth. The walls, which are now the browns, red and grays of dormant and cut twigs, will change with the seasons, greening in spring and transforming to the vibrant yellows, reds and oranges that characterize maples in the fall.”