Isabelle Dethier

Contemplated in their entirety, Isabelle Dethier's sculptures in wood manage to evoke both heft and weightlessness, serenity and flurry, stillness and flight. These opposing themes woven together by a vital life force are her point of departure. She draws inspiration from a multitude of patterns found in nature and from her exploration of Eastern philosophy. In articulating her spiritual and artistic truths, Isabelle Dethier's sculptures speak directly to the spirit of the person who encounters them.

©Meg Locsin.

Isabelle Dethier has studied in several European countries,has worked in a variety of materials; metal, paper, card, stone (alabaster) wood….and different artistic expressions.Yet throughout her work runs a theme of remarkable consistency: the inspiration from the abstraction of natural forms and their organic development. Plants are her main source; leaves and shoots, unfurling buds, calyx and petals, bursting seed pods, but she also observes the insect world and even fossils.

This influence is in no sense a straightforward copying of the materials she finds in nature, nor does it imply domestic charm or sentimentality.This is powerful work; pieces are large, and though, the idea may be rooted in the tender curl of a fern frond or flower bud, we are always reminded that these buds force themselves up from the depths of the earth, contain latent energy and burst into life.

Yet besides strength, this work has grace. Here are no angular forms which jar; the leaf may be magnified many times and ripple and tower over us, but the form remains enough of its organic character to connect with the human dimension and invoke a sympathetic response in the viewer.Nor is this sculpture simply the working of ideas - even if the symbiosis between man and nature lies at its heart.

Unfashionably, but in the classic tradition, Isabelle Dethier explores her different materials for the qualities inherent in each and pushes them to the limit of what is possible. Massive trunks of wood are carved directly with power tools or forms are built up from multiple layers of wood glued together, worked and polished to exploit the wandering grain and subtle shifts of colour, sheen and texture.

Alabaster shines in fragile translucent winged petals, sometimes highly polished, sometimes revealing its brittle crystalline structure; or it curls in on itself in comfortingly rounded solidity.Cut paper forms are stacked, to twist and fan out; riveted metal speak of the armourer's skills as the beetle's carapace.Her photographic work is an end in itself. Intensely observed and magnified details of familiar material-leaves, stamens, bark, moss- become abstract patterns or takes on a new and somewhat disturbing significance, as they open up a fresh approach to the natural world.As the illustrations show, these works are seen to best advantage in a woodland setting, where the organic forms complement the surrounding vegetation and seem to spring with their own life from the ground.

Yet in any space these are sculptures which offer beauty, an aesthetic appeal in forms and textures-but they also quietly challenge us to re-examine our own relationship with the minutiae of the environment that we tend to take for granted.

©Ros Falvey.

Wood:

...."As I gained confidence with wood and got to know it more, I allowed it to split, then I made features of the splitting. Now, I don't mind if my material changes. Wood is alive and one should accept that it warps. as I get to know the material I rather like working with green wood. I principally work with European woods, especially wood from my garden and surroundings, trees that haven't been especially cut for the purpose of wood sculpture ( either they were ill or about to fall or fallen already ): such as pear, cherry, lime, sycamore, chestnut, and poplar. "

©Isabelle Dethier.

"Growing not against the grain: in search of female identity in wood sculpture" by Rathsaran Sireekan (C_arts Mag)