Ronald Rae’s Return of the Prodigal sculpture was commissioned by General Accident in 1982 to interpret the company’s motto “I warn and I protect”. The composition of the father and son was inspired by Rembrandt’s painting of The Prodigal Son in The Hermitage, St.Petersburg.
After 30 years of standing on the hill above Perth, Nature has covered the sculpture with lichens adding colour and texture to the stone which greatly excites the sculptor.
In August 2012 Ronald Rae’s Heavy Horse and Foal moved to the Crinan Canal in Argyll where it was on loan to Scottish Canals for three years. It was such a perfect setting for the sculpture – the Heavy Horse and Foal at Lock 14 – there to welcome all the boats that pass through the Canal. However the sculpture has now returned to the Falkirk Wheel to join the Ronald Rae Exhibition of ten sculptures. Open all year – free admission.
The Heavy Horse and Foal took the sculptor over a year to be carve using hand tools only. The granite comes from Aberdeeenshire and has been dated over 460 million years old. For sale.
Granite: 7x10x5ft 10.00 tons. Location: The Falkirk Wheel. For Sale.
The sculpture celebrates horses being part of the heritage of canals remembered for pulling the barges before the Industrial Revolution. The Heavy Horse and Foal also expresses the love of animals for their young.
To see a short video of the sculpture being installed at Crinan where it was on exhibition for three years go to the right margin, under Latest News on Video click on Ronald Rae’s Heavy Horse and Foal at Crinan.
On Wednesday 15th August 2012 Ronald Rae visited fellow sculptor Alan Thornhill’s exhibition at the Museum in the Park, Stroud, Gloucestershire. Alan is known for his portrait heads of public figures some in the National Galleries of London, Edinburgh and Glasgow, also a series of expressive bronze sculptures permanently sited beside the River Thames at Putney. Alan who started his artistic life as a potter devised a unique technique of making sculpture which he passed on to his pupils at the Frink School of Sculpture. His retrospective at Stroud features a wonderful collection of bronzes large and small, drawings, paintings and pottery. For more information on Alan Thornhill and his work, many of which are for sale, visit his web site www.alanthornhill.co.uk
I can’t get it out of my head the foot that crushed the snail
In the way that life goes on I want that foot to feel shame
Closed perfection and closed resurrection this is no gain
Dispersed for the sake of being dispersed
For the sake of nothing at all reduced to a messy little corpse
What is all this to do with moving on to an afterlife
God knows we have other things to think about
Getting our families out of this war to safety
Taking to the border who we are and what we stand for
Who cares about snails and their afterlife
What a wish getting our families to safety
Like sitting on eggs you just hope they will hatch
If ever again we arrive that we shoot at windows just for the faces behind them
Of course we should die of course we should be dead
Never again in eternity should we be allowed to open our eyes
What we did and are still doing to one another
There’s more to it than having a few scratches on our faces
Passports and bread these are not to be bruised or burned
These are not to be seen as belonging to the walking dead
Look for yourself at the queues waiting to be fed
None are talking none are shouting
Step at a time they are moving slower than the snail killed this morning
Ronald Rae
Pen on newspaper – June 2012.
23″ x 29″
Ronald Rae’s cartoons comprise surreal images and poetical comments that happen spontaneously in reaction to the graphics or text on the printed page.
On Monday evening 4th June Ronald Rae gave a passionate talk to 36 very enthusiastic Cubs from the 82nd Craigalmond (Cramond) Scout Group. They enjoyed bonding with the Baby Elephant sculpture and climbing on to the Cramond Fish but the highlight was having a lesson on how to carve granite. I believe there are now several budding sculptors in Cramond!
How can you go about your business
Knowing that you have murdered innocent children
Even with a torch shining in your face
How can you say that you are the animator of freedom
Your likeness why must you walk it over broken glass
With your cast iron certainty that it orchestrates hell on earth
Where do you go to find in the mirror
A face that justifies what you have done
Your conscience it must be like living inside a belt of bullets
If the rats are hungry and
You feed them with an army out of control
What can you expect surely nothing less
Than cruelty out of control
There may be a blue sky overhead
And a morning worth living for
But this is not what the weapon
Over your shoulder notices
Your own quote – Who dares deserves to live
And for that I pity you
For it is with the glue of dust and blood
If you have a soul that your soul is joined to you
Ronald Rae
So you’re off – today’s the day the final big push
A young man’s game I hope you know what you’re doing
Spread your wings but watch out for those
Who would tear your wings from the skies
Watch out for the meaning that it be lost
The footfall watch out for where it falls
If nothing else keep the kindnesses our mother and father gave us
Mother selling her engagement ring to put bread on the table
Our father heading his prayers that they become real
The welcome when you come home keep thinking it
For that we’ll wait and we’ll see it through
For you my brother there will always be bread on the table
For the cost of a small artificial diamond
In our home tonight the overcoat of the dark will be lifted
My passionate impossible brother yours is our recovery
Way beyond from being a vigil this war of yours
Has every creak in the house waiting for your return
Ronald Rae
Granite: 5x11x3ft. 6.00 tons. Location: National Trust for Scotland, Threave Gardens, Dumfries and Galloway. Sold. After being on loan to the NTS for three years St. Francis will now be staying on at Threave due to the generosity of long term NTS members George and Sue Thomas.
Photography by Lenny Warren.
THREAVE GARDEN SCULPTURE EXHIBITION 2012.
On Saturday 23rd June 2012 Kate Mavor, the Chief Executive of the National Trust for Scotland unveiled Ronald Rae’s St. Francis sculpture and opened the second Threave Garden Sculpture Exhibition showing works by several Scottish based sculptors in the formal garden at Threave. The exhibition continues till May 2013. A catalogue of the exhibition is available at the Visitor Centre.
In the summer of 2011 Ronald Rae opened the first Threave Sculpture Garden Exhibition. He spoke passionately about the potential of displaying larger sculptures at Threave and offered the NTS one of his works on loan. The NTS jumped at this wonderful opportunity. It was agreed that St. Francis would be perfect in this garden setting because of the saint’s love of Nature – birds in particular. Birdsong is the first sound one hears on entering Threave Garden.
George Thomas, from NTS Threave Garden who organised this project said ” I am absolutely delighted to have been involved with Ronald Rae’s incredibly generous gesture of lending St. Francis to Threave Garden. He has chosen a stunning piece entirely in keeping with the site. It undoubtedly creates a unique feature in the garden which will give pleasure to visitors and act as a focus of widespread interest.”
This emotive work depicts St. Francis lying in retreat on “that rugged rock twixt Tiber and Arno” as Dante described La Verna. The sculpture shows the saint surrounded by the birds that he loved and preached to. Brother Wolf is carved on the other side of the stone. Legend has it that St. Francis saved the village of Gubbio from being ravished of its flocks by persuading the people to feed the fierce hungry wolf. In return for this kindness the wolf became a friend to everyone and a follower of St. Francis and thereafter called Brother Wolf.
It has been written that on this mountainside St. Francis took on the stigmata – the wounds of Christ. In his sculpture Rae has given Brother Wolf the stigmata. Legend also says that when St. Francis died Brother Wolf was at his side.
The St. Francis stone from Tillyfourie Quarry in Aberdeenshire is of great geological interest being a mix of pink and silver-grey granite and dark grey basalt that fused together when the Earth was being formed. For this stone that happened 470 million years ago!
To see a short video of St. Francis being installed see News heading at the top margin of the Home page.