Myth Of Sisyphus 00 Details

Description

An abstract representation of the mythic figure of Sisyphus -- doomed by the gods to forever roll a rock up a hill only to have it roll back down before he achieves the summit. Sisyphus has become synonymous with futile, frustrating and pointless tasks but some, notably Albert Camus in his essay, "The Myth of Sisysphus," have another notion of the nature of both Sisyphus and mankind.

Camus claims that Sisyphus is the ideal absurd hero and that his punishment is representative of the human condition: Sisyphus must struggle perpetually and without hope of success. So long as he accepts that there is nothing more to life than this absurd struggle, then he can find happiness in it, says Camus. [1]

And from the essay itself:

I leave Sisyphus at the foot of the mountain! One always finds one's burden again. But Sisyphus teaches the higher fidelity that negates the gods and raises rocks. He too concludes that all is well. This universe henceforth without a master seems to him neither sterile nor futile. Each atom of that stone, each mineral flake of that night-filled mountain, in itself forms a world. The struggle itself toward the heights is enough to fill a man's heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy. [2]

I've had this piece of wood and have been thinking about and working on this peice since around 2008 or 2009. Even back then I had the notion that it would be based on what I knew of the myth of Sisyphus. I could see the figure in the wood and found a rock that seemed to fit well. I had prepared the mount, drilled a hole in the stone and even had a coat of finish on the whole thing and then I lost the rock one day. After hours of searching I gave up and put the project on the shelf.

Step forward to about two months ago when I found the rock after a good cleaning of my shop. I figured it was time to finish up the project, but it was still missing something. It wasn't until I stumbled upon the essay by Camus that it all came together. The more I read about Absurdism and Camus, the more I came to realize how germane the whole myth and philosophy are to our time. From the Wikipedia article on Absurdism (emphasis mine) [3]:

In absurdist philosophy, the Absurd arises out of the fundamental disharmony between the individual's search for meaning and the meaninglessness of the universe.

With that fire kindled, it was easy to put the project on a fast track and in a flash of inspiration, I realized that by carving the tops of the arms, the structure and the sides of his head, it really gave the piece the form it needed. Using a scraper and a bit of sandpaper I completed the work and then covered it in one coat of semi-gloss polyurethane. The bark and the stone already had several coats of danish oil.  

Description: Found art sculpture of wood (oak?), stone (gneiss?) and quartz tile. 

[1] SparkNotes.com, "The Myth of Sisyphus"

[2] Albert Camus, "The Myth of Sisyphus"

[3] Wikipedia, "Absurdism"