Abstract sculpture welcomes all to the library

Just inside the doors to the library at the new Central High School, classical music plays softly and three figures wait to usher students from the noise and excitement of the hallway into the realm of books and academics. The figures don't have names, but students often touch the human forms chiseled from catalpa wood by Central High School art teacher Robert Friedrich. The intent is for the students to enter this world in a different mental state.

The sculpture consists of three abstract figures and realistic-looking books. It makes a connection between learning and what can be done with it, says head librarian Julia Jorgensen, who commissioned the work.

"It's a compliment to the staff that we have somebody with that level of talent."

Friedrich is one of very few sculptors teaching at the high school level in the region. He began sculpting the as yet untitled work last winter. He was almost finished with the first version, made of sycamore, before discovering the wood inside was rotting. Friedrich started all over with catalpa logs from a farm near Advance, Mo.

Friedrich is a Jackson High School product, a U.S. Army veteran and an art education graduate of Southeast Missouri State University. While at the university, art professor Dr. Edwin Smith got him interested in sculpting.

Two of Friedrich's outdoor sculptures are still on the campus, one behind the old art building and the other next to the Baptist Student Union. Two pieces of his pottery are on display farther inside the Central High School library.

Besides wood, Friedrich also works in metal and stone. It's art and hard work.

"The fatigue of it all is enjoyable to me," he says.

Jorgensen wanted the sculpture to honor the three generations of her family who have attended Central High School. Her father, the late Julian Howes, was the first member of the family to attend Central High School, graduating in 1943. Jorgensen herself graduated in 1969. Her daughter, Maggie Clark, graduated from the school in 2000.

"My family feels so blessed by Central High School," she says.

She paid for the sculpture with money she received from winning one of the Edna C. Kinder Excellence in Teaching Awards in 2001.

Her only other direction to Friedrich was that the sculpture should recognize the importance of books.

Ironically, books did not have much influence on him becoming an artist, Friedrich says, but they became important once he decided to become a teacher. Besides sculpture, he also teaches art history.

Reading has made him appreciate the Zen quality of the work he does, the sense that the natural world and the emotions of the artist all become one. "Working in wood, that's how I feel," he says. "I've got a lot of respect for it."

Friedrich was glad to have the freedom to make the figures abstract rather than realistic. Even their sex is undefined.

"You can paint something as realistic as you want, and it's still an abstraction," he says. "It's not the real thing."

Each of the three figures sits on a pedestal at a different height. "As you move around the pieces, it changes to a different sculpture," Friedrich says.

The wood is finished but not sanded. It bears his chisel marks proudly. He understands why students touch the sculpture.

"I get into trouble all the time at big museums," he said.

Students have been invited to submit names for the work. Community members also are welcome to play name that sculpture.

The sculpture Friedrich is working on now already has a name: "Mother with Child." His wife, Lisa, is due to give birth to their first child Christmas Day.

sblackwell@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 182