NEW PIECES IN THE GUTHRIE CONTEMPORARY GALLERY

Left to right: "L'Origine du Monde," "Man Ray," "Déjeuner sur l'herbe," "Antiquity," "Niagara."

With one foot out of the door as I prepare to leave for my annual summer sojourn in France, I was pleased to place several works in the Guthrie Contemporary Gallery. They include four sculptures and two paintings. Two of the sculptures, "Antiquity" (cherry wood), and "Androgyne" (granite), represent female forms. "Man Ray" (marble) and "Niagara" (stained cypress) are abstract pieces. In addition, the gallery has hung two of my large abstract paintings, "Déjeuner sur l'herbe," and "L'Origine du Monde." Astute students of art history will recognize those titles as belonging to famous works by Manet and Courbet. My paintings in no way resemble those famous canvases but I felt the titles were somehow evocative of the spirit of my pieces. This is what the French call a "clin d'oeil"—a wink. These works will be in the gallery all summer and into the fall.

Guthrie Contemporary Gallery
3815 Magazine Street
New Orleans, LA 70115
504-897-2688
www.guthriecontemporary.com

Please visit my website: sylvainesancton.com











3815 Magazine Street, New Orleans 70115.

"SURVIVAL" GOES TO THE OGDEN

My monumental pecan wood and steel sculpture, "Survival," has been admitted into the permanent collection of the Ogden Museum of Southern Art. I am grateful for this honor and pleased to have my work represented in this great institution.

"Survival" has an interesting back story. The 81-inch high wooden column was fashioned from the trunk of a century-old Louisiana pecan tree felled by hurricane Katrina. This noble trunk could have been burned to ashes, ground to sawdust, or wound up in a landfill. Instead, it found its way into my hands and I decided to give it a new life even as my adopted city was rebuilding its own life. The carved surface depicts a series of intersecting waves, evoking the waters that battered and engulfed the city in 2005. The natural veins and striations in the wood trace the growth and evolution of this living organism before it was uprooted and transformed into a tribute to endurance and renewal. Finally, the steel spine suggests the industrial prowess, the engineering know-how, the energy and the creativity of this proud region. I consider "Survival" to be a pean to nature’s force and man’s indomitable spirit, and I am delighted that it has found a permanent place in the Ogden.

My website: sylvainesancton.com
The Ogden website: http://ogdenmuseum.org