Institute Of Medical Science , Aberdeen commission - bronze,  2.5 m x 3.5 m and weighs a ton

Concept:

The sculpture is a result of combining art and the science of representing. It is also about observance, mapping and describing the nature of growth.

The progress of the work was akin to plotting a journey from the abyss and the unknown up into the light, and with each breakthrough, revealing a new world. Time after time, layer by layer, like the nautilus, the work built a rhythm, flowing from the past to the present. Both medical science and the arts break into this rhythm of life through observation and recording, driven by an inherent curiosity and thirst for knowledge, and understanding. We build a structure of “knowing” that is propelled forward (and back), like the nautiloid spiral – its chambers fused sealed but inextricably linked – form, in our mind, an idea of time, however incomplete. Thus, our work is done.

Each growth phase of nautilus pompilius is characterised by successive chambers known technically as septa, the complete shell being mostly typically spiral in shape.

This form mirrors closely the proportioning of the Golden Section, a harmonious man-made measuring tool with its unique capacity to unite different parts of a whole. (Similarly, in the specialist Departments of IMS). Each compartment retains its own integrity yet, co-joined fulfils a greater pattern and rhythm.

The sculpture denotes a calculated “industrial” mapping of the Golden Section and of one of natures wonders. The relief-cast in bronze (that most classical of sculptural mediums), bronze plate, riveted, and patinateed, waxed and polished, contrasts starly perhapswith the scaled-up cast of the outer nautilus shell. One is forced to consider a nature in overdrive. However , the sculpture's simplicity too evokes contemplation.