- — December 18, 2009
Monumental. Patricia Haase, sculptor
Selected by Retha Hayward, owner, Manitou Arts Center
"Sometimes she watches you,” says Manitou Arts Center owner Retha Hayward about Little Old Lady, the not-so-little Stoneware clay and paint bust created by sculptor Patricia Haase. The work has received a lot of attention, winning Best of Show at the Puyallup Fine Arts show in September and eliciting responses from its perch at the Art Center where Haase rents studio space.
The monumental size of the work calls for attention, but, as Hayward explains, the expert manner in which Haase constructed the old lady’s facial features is the truly entrancing feature. “As the light in ‘her’ room changes, her expression becomes more or less stern, more or less inviting or questioning,” Hayward says. “It is a nice commentary on the artwork, as well as the artist, that the work challenges the viewer to see beyond the fired clay and allows the freedom to inject one’s feelings and interpretations into the encounter with art. The statue has become a companionable studio resident, never intrusive or demanding and always
peacefully watching.”
Haase knows something of her sculpture’s power. “During last year’s [Art at Work] studio tour, a taciturn eighty-plus-year-old regular walking toward her weekly Pinochle game down the hallway turned around and emphatically said, ‘that’s right!’ after I told a visitor the subtitle of the work: Little Old Lady ...as in Never Underestimate a....”
Manitou Art Center is located at 4806 66th Street in Tacoma. Both Patricia Haase and Retha Hayward will be participating in this year’s Art at Work Studio Tours, November 7 – 8, 10:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m.
