I was listening to a Podcast about a German writer called Christa Wolff. Neil McGregor, then head of the British Museum, was talking about the impact the Wall had on families and friends when they became divided by it.
Christa Wolff wrote about this period in her novel ‘Der Geteilte Himmel’. ‘Himmel’ is the word for both ‘sky’ and ‘heaven’.
On watching the wall being built, the main character, Manfred, says to his wife Rita “at least they can’t divide the sky”.
I was struck by the simplicity of this idea as a sculptor. The phrase implies an unbounded freedom. I wanted to create a sense of longing in a new series of Sculpturescapes in response to this. It had to express the wonder of the firmament above us, from the vantage point of a drain, a cell, a tunnel or a wall.
