Often, when I am asked to comment upon this work, I explain : " It is the story of people who read people's minds who, them'selves, read other people's minds and so forth... like culture which is passed on from one generation to another in a way... But sometimes one of them refuses to read, and behind him everything deteriorates and there is nothing one can do about it. "
versions ![]()
This sculpture came from
a sketch hastily drawn on a train. It only showed
a man reading the book-shaped head of another man. This could just have
been a humouristic drawing. I hadn't thought at the time that this sketch
would lead me to such a big piece.
I developed the idea, the mind-reading process followed quite quickly.
From the start I devised my first character in a love relief.
Then I began to shape this character with his head turned into a
book and looking downwards.
Separately, I made set of hands.
I moulded all these elements in "alginate" (well suited for
quickly-made and temporary moulds). I made six or seven copies of these
pieces in plaster. Then I gathered them together on a wooden stick to
have a general idea...
I stopped there at first.
I rather liked it but it couldn't be considered as a sculpture really.
The idea of the reader who refuses to read came to my mind later on, and then I realized that the piece I was working on would be much larger than I previously imagined.
I set a series of heads, and again one above the other on a wooden stick,
I made a different expression for each face and I placed the hand
differently as well.
I asked my founder to make a large mould of this stick, and from partial
copies of this mould I was able to to work out the whole piece....
![]() |

|
Bruce Krebs, sculptor 9 ter street Amelot, 17 000 La Rochelle, France, Europe. To send an E-mail to me:atelier.bruce.krebs@wanadoo.fr |