Sea Dog, 2004, Wood, wax, shells, hemp and found objects, 61 x 28 x 38.2 cm
Missionary, 2004, Wood, wax, shells, metal and bucket, 81.3 x 33 x 39.4 cm
Lighthouse Keeper, 2005, Wood, wax, shells, seaweed, metal and found objects, 99 x 39.4 x 44.5 cm
China Seas, 2005, Wood, wax, hemp and found objects, 114 x 81 x 56 cm
Harpooneer, 2005, Wood, wax, metal, shells, brush, seaweeed and found objects, 111.7 x 49.5 x 76.2 cm
Captain Langsdorff, 2006, Wood, wax, shells and found objects, 111.8 x 66 x 73.7 cm
Jonah, 2006, Wood, wax, glass, kelp, shells, cobra and found objects, 29.3 x 49.6 x 66 cm
Gallows Jack, 2007, Wood, wax, shells, feathers and found objects, 110 x 80 x 48 cm
Vice Admiral of the Narrow Seas, 2007, Wood, wax, rubber, plastic, cuttle fish and found objects, 85 x 36 x 63 cm
Cape Fear, 2008, Wood, wax, bone, shells, hessian, quartz and found objects, 93 x 52 x 62 cm
Cape Tormentoso, 2008, Wood, wax, rubber, shells and found objects, 134 x 83 x 47 cm
Peter the Cruel, 2008, Wood, wax, shells, rubber,quartz kelp and found objects, 89 x 36 x 54 cm
Rum, Sodomy and the Lash, 2008, Wood, wax, rubber, shells, bone, kelp and found objects, 150 x 86 x 53 cm
Bluemull Sound, 2008, Wood, wax, metal, shells, bone, rubber and found objects, 100 x 36 x 53 cm
Mountebank, 2008, Wood, wax, shells, jaw bone and found objects, 98 x 43 x 56 cm
Huckster, 2008, Wood, wax, rubber, shells, bone, kelp and glass, 128 x 51 x 49 cm
Cape Wrath, 2008, Wood, wax, shells, amethyst, heather roots and found objects, 111 x 64 x 47 cm
South China Sea, 2008, Wood, wax, rubber, kelp, bone, shells and found objects, 119 x 102 x 102 cm
Opium, 2009, Wood, wax, rubber, shells, cloth, bambo and found objects, 130 x 122 x 80 cm
Flintmarsh, 2009, Wood, wax, rubber, shells, metal, bird’s wings and found objects, 112 x 43 x 58 cm
Saltpeter Man, 2009, Wood, wax, rubber, metal, plastic, shells, crab claws, brushes and found objects, 95.5 x 41 x 54 cm
Ancient Mariner, 2009, Wood, wax, shells, rubber metal and found objects, 116 x 50 x 57.5 cm
Monsieur Violet, 2010, Wood, wax, rubber, plastic, shells and found objects, 102 x 59 x 82 cm
Small Head Study 5, 2008, clay, 10 x 6.5 x 7 cm
Small Head Study 8, 2008, clay, 13 x 7.5 x 7 cm
War Victim 1, 2014, Wood, wax, metal, rubber, shells, quartz and found objects, 107 x 52 x 59.5 cm
War Victim 2, 2014, Wood, wax, metal, rubber, shells, bones and found objects, 118 x 57 x 55 cm
Janus, 2018, Wood, wax, shells, bone, metal, plastic, rubber and found objects,
Extract from a catalogue essay by Jeff Sawtell, September 2006.
‘Waller refers to the Jungian architypes of the hero and anti-hero, or more specifically the trickster, fool and redeemer – those mischievous manifestations of the mind that battle for supremacy in our unconscious. He seeks representations of these architypes in the Homeric tradition, Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s Ancient Mariner, Herman Melville’s Moby Dick, Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness and Ernest Hemmingway’s Old Man of The Sea.
He’s also inspired by real adventurers and explorers, those men who have been shaped by circumstance and sacrifice, men like Ernest Shackleton, Roald Amundsen and Fridtjof Nansen. Whether works of fiction or men of action, they all in different ways exhibit a spirit of endeavour, the struggle to go beyond the bounds of the accepted; men driven by passion, psychosis or the perks of power.
Thus Waller creates his head sculptures from the salvage of his studio, the flotsam and jetsam of the street and beach: lathe, shells and found objects held together with wax and nails to resemble human shipwrecks. These new sculptures take his themes further, larger and darker, stretching the analogy with survivors, simultaneously appearing simple and complex, their apparent invincibility on closer inspection revealing a fragility common to humanity.’
Some of these works and others in the series are for sale. Please contact me for details.