Felicity

	Artist: Alexander Carrick
	Title: Felicity
	Year: 1934
	Medium: bronze
	Dimensions:
	Suggested topic: figure composition
	Source: RSA Diploma Collection
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© Irene M Scott
Description: Carrick's sculpture of Felicity is a bronze of a standing woman, her back pressed against a child as she holds a smaller child over her shoulder. The arrangement of the bodies and their intertwined limbs is very complex. The lines of the arms, legs and torso lead our gaze up, down and round the piece. The gaze of each figure also leads our eye around the piece; from the woman's downward glance, to the young boy who looks up at the baby. The figures are tightly placed against each other, making a strong upright shape which seems almost like one being.The sculture is cast in bronze, a material which is very hard and durable yet he has successfully embodied the feeling of warm flesh and blood. The modelling is bold and convincing, but with a very fine finish. The softness of the muscles in each figure looks very authentic, but Carrick has simplified his rendering of real muscles to focus on more general forms rather than tiny details. The highlights are very important in a bronze like this one. How the light reflects from the surface determines a lot about the viewer's perception of the piece. For example, the sharply defined highlights on the boy's chest show that these areas were modelled almost as a flat plane. The softer, more rounded highlights on the woman's head indicate not only a curved surface but a surface which is less highly polished. If you half-close your eyes, the complex interaction of highlights, middle-tones and shadows becomes easier to see. Try to look at the sculpture like this and investigate its abstract form rather than seeing it as three people.The mood of this piece is deeply intimate and emotional. A view of a family group such as this gives us a much more complex view than the traditional Madonna and Child. The closeness of the figures to each other, the loving touches and the playful poses express the love between a mother and her children.