Cry for Justice - The Scream

If you fancy admiring some thought provoking creativity take a stroll around the grounds of Durham University, Stockton Road in Durham City.

I will list the other pieces in the area at the end but let's concentrate on Cry For Justice - The Scream which is an affecting installation near the Bill Bryson Library and outside the Geography Department that own it.

In 2013 the University spent 1.4 million pounds on art. Hopefully, the works have increased in value.

The artist is Fenwick Lawson (born 1932) and inspiration came mainly from two sources. One is Edvard Munch's The Scream which was created circa 1893 and it represents an internal emotion as it is symbolist in style. Some say his work looks unfinished. Dr. Lawson had previously created work based on this and one piece aptly called 'The Scream' 1985 is at Ushaw Historic House and Gardens

The other source of inspiration is the dramatic photograph The Terror of War and colloquially known as 'The Napalm Girl' It was taken in 1972 by Nick Ult who was a photographer covering the Vietnam War. The 9 year old girl, Kim Phúc and others were running away from a deadly napalm attack. She was shouting 'too hot , too hot'. Kim Phúc was scolded and taken to hospital by Nick and his colleagues, where they had to insist that treatment was given. Kim Phúc survived after 14 months and 17 surgeries. Nick Ult won the Pulitzer Prize and it was chosen as the World Press Photo of the Year for 1973..

However, the story of that photograph does not end there. Kim Phúc went on to study medicine but was taken out of the university for propaganda reasons by the communist government of Vietnam. At 23 years old she was allowed to study in Cuba and met Bui Huy Toan who became her husband. Their honeymoon was to be spent in Moscow. However the plane stopped for refuelling in Newfoundland, Canada, and there, they asked and were granted political asylum. She has become a distinguished humanitarian.

I wonder if this sculpture shows that through resilience and faith like Kim Phúc and Nick Ult you can do great things.

Dr Fenwick Lawson is known for using a chainsaw to create his images and in this case it seems to portray a rawness to the subject. The work has been coated in bronze adding another dimension. As far as I can find Cry For Justice - The Scream was not a commissioned piece as I believe it has been on display elsewhere i.e. Leicester Cathedral in 2010.

From the plaque:

'In 1972 when I saw, on television, the Vietnamese girl covered in burning napalm, running, screaming in pain and fear, I was deeply shocked and horrified. My revulsion, of this instance of the inhumanity of humankind, informed this sculpture; this image is about that hurt. The chainsaw 'hurts' the wood and the brutality of its action is meant to express, in a format way, the pain and suffering of the child. I added the mother and child image, to increase the tension by exposing the vulnerability of the baby's head. The mother's scream refers to Edvard Munch's painting 'The Scream' (1893), a reference to the universality of that image. The stumbling, falling, disintegrating child, with no hands to protect, further increases the vulnerability. The child left standing, unable to run, compounds the trauma. Witnessing the horror, an analogous contemporary trauma, the boy in Iraq who lost his arms, I dismembered the arms of the running girl. 'I see this image as crucifixion'

(The Napalm girl survived and lives today in Canada)

Fenwick Lawson born 1932

Fenwick Lawson is local to County Durham,he has studied and taught in the area. There are other works in the area; Pieta at Durham Cathedral, Cuthbert of Farne at The Museum and Heritage centre and The Journey outside the Gala Theatre. From his website:

"During the 1960's and 70's Lawson's work was within the mainstream of the time concerning itself with the 'objectness' of the object; it was art for arts sake. Whilst this genre had validity in its own right, it was not fulfilling his total self. He felt the need to redefine his work to include a moral content in order to engage with the human condition. Most of these later works could be seen to be religious.

However, if the viewer is prepared to look beyond the religious narrative, they will see that it is used as a metaphor within which the sculptor can express his consciousness of humanity and inhumanity. The metaphor is timeless and transcends the dominant culture. Its concern with the human condition has both historical and contemporary relevance."

Inside the Palatine Centre on the University Campus is another piece by Fenwick Lawson, that also explores the concept of Freedom

Go wonder at other works nearby which include What Lies Beneath that gives you a lesson in geology. There is a horizontal analemmatic Sundial and Mathematical concepts with Willmore Surface.