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Irving to launch new book
The Herald (Zimbabwe)
June 15, 2005

http://www.herald.co.zw/index.php?id=44342&pubdate=2005-06-15

PIECES of Time, an anthology of articles on Zimbabwe’s stone sculpture by established writer Celia Winter Irving, will be launched this Saturday in Harare.

This is the eighth book by Winter Irving, which consists of articles published in The Herald and The Mirror newspapers between 1991 and 2002.

In his foreword to Pieces of Time, Titus Chipangura, the director of the National Arts Council of Zimbabwe, writes: "With flowing and poetic language, Celia Winter Irving brings the stone sculpture to life and presents it as more than objects or simply works of art."

Mambo Press, the publishers of the book, selected the best articles to allow a wide range of issues and topics dealing with the stone sculpture to be discussed.

The author covered areas critical to the ongoing debate about identity and character of stone sculpture and its position in what is taking place in the modern and contemporary sculpture in the international art world today.

The backgrounds of individual sculptors are well documented and emphasis is placed on how the sculptors today are meeting the challenges of globalisation and the growing popularity of art with international rather than national boundaries.

Through the articles, Winter Irving gets under the skin of the stones to realise the sculptors’ intentions and their inner feelings about their work and being a sculptor in Zimbabwe.

Widely referential, the essays display knowledge of traditions of sculpture outside of Zimbabwe (in particular European ecclesiastic sculpture from the Romanesque to the Baroque) and contemporary directions of sculpture in the international art world.

The great names of stone sculpture are familiar to the author such as the late Nicholas Mukomberanwa, the late Henry Munyaradzi, the late Bernard Matemera and today Dominic Benhura whose life and work is documented in several essays in the book.

*Winter Irving is the curator for the National Gallery of Zimbabwe and a sculpture columnist for The Herald, Southern Times and Sky Host.

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