Wide Water Man

Viola Frey has been described as a "visual anthropologist of contemporary culture."  The sources for her vividly alert figures are fellow bus riders and others observed during the course of daily living.  They communicate through stylized gestures and facial contortions.  Grandmother and Wide Water Man represent middle class America-he with his blue business suit, she with her pumps and colorful dress.  In works like these, Frey transforms the frozen world of porcelain tabletop figurines into what she calls monumental "myths of childhood."

Each sculpture is made up of sections weighing no more than fifty pounds each, the maximum weight Frey can lift without assistance.  Upon these broad surfaces, she paints layer upon layer of brilliant glazes that breathe life into the towering figures.