POINT OF DEPARTURE: Works by Patrick H. Ricard

For more than twenty years Ricard has been a maker of fine furnishings and

liturgical works, a self-taught artisan. Though, prior to this exhibit, his work was

functional, it had always come through from his love of the process, of working with his

hands, of letting Spirit take over and allowing the material to tell him what it wanted to

become.

Seeking a closer connection to his work, he undertook a less rehearsed approach

and found an explosion of artistic renewal. He recalls a visit to the Tate Modern,

some five years ago. Upon enter a gallery of major modern sculptors he fell silent as he

walked into the grand space awestruck, spellbound, mesmerized. They seemed to speak

to him of soul and spirit. He found among those works new things he needed to work

toward…a point of departure.

Ricard brought this resultant collection together in three modules. The first set of

sculptures consist of metals and hardwoods and were executed not only with mastery of

traditional craft but are strongly sculptural, architectural. Compositions in the second

module are of metal and willow rods reflecting feminine shapes; straight-edged

silhouettes with corseted curves. The final components of the trio are crisp and precise

while at the same time playful — whimsical creatures seeming to float within

colorful towered wooden structures.