Victory just isn't what it used to be. Winged Victory embraces the glory and grace of victory in its purest form, while acknowledging its inevitable cost. She is formed from high-fired ceramic and found metal from metal found in the hills around Santa Fe. Rusted and bullet-ridden, she rises from the chaos, lovely still and reaching for a higher meaning.
In the third century when the Winged Victory of Samothrace was created, Nike ruled as the goddess of winners. If war is hell, victory is heaven, where you can claim military and even moral superiority.
Nowadays victory in war is a complex thing at best, shot full of contradictions, collateral damage, moral crises, and uncertain outcomes. Governments declare victories every day, political and military. But we the people of the world have become a cynical lot, and the bloggers and Youtube videos expose too much of what conflict really costs.
Yet in some ways victory still belongs to us in its purest form. We rejoice when we claim victory over our own limitations, or better yet, victory over oppressive authority or our own violent tendencies.
Winged Victory
Stoneware, found metal with bullet holes (cylinder, green disc, scraps)
26 x 20 x 20 inches
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