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You may have already seen this work some time ago, all white and ready for firing. And here it is after the firing in agama kiln, standing on the stump in Sapiegos Park. It's my own favorite work to date, and the biggest one, standing almost one meter high. Too bad I can't fit something of that size in my own kiln, as it was such a nice feeling to work on a human body scale object! As I remember inching it up coil-by-coil there were hours full of doubt: will I spend some 80 hours making some overcomplicated monstrosity? I have agreed with Beatrice Keleriene beforehand that she will accept one meter high work into her kiln and place it in the front of the kiln, so that one meter was some sort of reference point when building up. I remember that at 60 cm mark I really disliked how my work was looking - like I tried to do something and the suddenly changed my mind.

But I kept going and looking at the tape-line to make it all come together just before the end. And somehow it happened! For me, these last centimeters always look super-important for the final look and feel of the work, so usually I spend an unproportional amount of time making slightest of tweaks till it looks just right.

Work itself speaks about universal desire to grow and evolve, up and into the light - I am speaking about humans and plants alike. Even if the process isn't straightforward and one takes some strange turns - doesn't it make one's history personal and valuable?

P.S. This was the first work that I made a maquette for. It really helped to achieve a better proportion of height and width in the final work, though they don't really look similar after all. I'll find and share this maquette the next time.

P.P.S. I remember talking with Beatrice on the phone to agree on the size of work before starting building it - I said something like: “I want to build one meter high, about 30 cm wide, ugly shaped cylinder!”