The Lizard’s Tale

The Lizard’s Tale

The Lizard’s Tale

By: Philip Booth, 2010
Medium: cast bronze
Size: 87mm
Cast by: Zahra Modern Art Foundries
Issue: The Medal, no 59 (Autumn 2011)

Edition: 27

Category:

Philip Booth (b. 1949) is a sculptor who has worked for many years in both Britain and Japan. His twenty years as lecturer and programme leader at Falmouth College of Arts from 1981was broken in 1995-97 by two years as visiting professor of sculpture at Nagoya University of Arts. From 2002 he was professor of design at Nagoya before returning to Cornwall in 2010. He has also served as visiting lecturer at several other institutions in both countries. His work has been exhibited in St Ives, London and elsewhere in Britain, as well as in Osaka, Tokyo and Nagoya, and site specific works have included those for Cornwall’s Eden Project (2002) and, with Yasuo Terada, for Expo Japan 2005; the latter work is now installed at Chukyo University.

About his BAMS medal the artist writes: ‘The two-part format for this medal is one which I have been exploring for a number of years. It is a format that I have found interesting for its flexibility and its potential for creating surprise, contrast and unexpected relationships. It also has a greater degree of observer participation in the way it is seen.

Inspiration for the motif of this medal came from a visit to southern Italy last year. In the place we stayed, the profusion of lizards emerging from tiny holes and crevasses was both astonishing and intriguing. As an idea began to form, so did the Haiku which is to be found on the inside face of the front disc and it was this which came to drive the development of the idea. Using four faces, I sought to evoke resonances and responses in a non-linear way, in much the same way as a Haiku does. The “misspelling” of Tale is deliberate.’