MY HEART SOARS
Another piece of Utah oolitic limestone, about 3 ft high by 1 ft wide and deep. This sculpture was carved, as a group project, by the beginners' carving class at the 1996 NWSSA Stone Carving Symposium, at Camp Brotherhood, near Mount Vernon, WA. It was designed by myself and Meredith Earls, with whom I was teaching that year, and in the course of the two week event, over 40 carvers had their hands in on it. The image came from a book that Meredith had, of a Japanese folk tale about an artist who comes to the end of his life, laments that he had not really known the true beauty he had been seeking, and is transformed into a swan, thereby beginning a beautiful new life. After several years of wandering, the sculpture came to live in my first stone circle, and now resides on Guemes Island, amid a gorgeous flower garden at the home of my dear friends, Lane Parks and Susan Ferrel. The communal artistic spirit that gave her birth is alive and well in the Madrona community there.