Icons

The Celts, like all ancient peoples, depended upon knowing how to manage earths resources for their survival. Like them they followed a solar calendar to know when to sow and when to reap. The Celtic year was marked by four main festivals marking the orbit of the Earth around the Sun: Samhain, marking winters approach culminating with the winter solstice; Imbolc, heralding the coming of spring and the equinox; Beltane, looking towards the summer solstice, and Lughnasadh, the harvest and autumn equinox. My aim was to symbolize these four.

I began by studying examples of Celtic art, mainly sculpture and metalwork and these provided the source for the images. First were four little figures. I gave each a colour to represent each of the festivals and the seasons they occurred – Samhain: blue (winter), Imbolc: green (spring), Beltane: red (summer) and Lughnasadh: yellow (autumn). The four masks I made a different metal – S: silver, I: bronze, B: iron and L: gold. The next four figures I imagined as dancers in the Ballets Russes perhaps. All of these images finally coalesced into the four icons where shape, colour and expression combined.