By Alan Brown, Lake Orion, MI
Colorado Marble
Summerland Passage is the third in a series of marble/bronze, life-sized, nature-themed sculptures featuring a Forest Deity. The piece is based on the shared belief of many of the nature-themed religions that all living things have spirits. The Deity is named Trillium, for the Trillium Flowers framing her head. She is performing a ceremony of passage for one of her woodland creatures whose spirit is about to depart from its earthly vessel to Summerland. Summerland, from the Wicca Religion, is a place of rest, reunion and reflection for spirits between earthly incarnations. A Kestrel is laid out upon a bed of flowers on her lap. Trillium holds out an offering of flowers to attract a butterfly, symbolic of the transformation and rebirth of the spirit. As in the two sculptures proceeding her, Colorado Marble was used for the head, hands, and feet. The body is bronze. She is cloaked in leaves and flowers from the surrounding forest.
