Projects -> Trip to Iraq in 2002 & Sculpture Project

Photo from Deryk's trip
Photos of Deryk's Sculpture Project

In September and October of 2002, Deryk returned to Iraq to work with Iraqi artists, building a mother and child sculpture.

Report from Deryk in Baghdad
(October 1, 2002 - part one)

I have now been in Baghdad for several days and am slowly adapting to the time change, the heat, the overwhelming pollution, and the street chaos. I have been invited by the minister of culture to come to Baghdad to supervise the casting of my bronze sculpture for my Peace Sanctuary project in British Columbia, Canada.

There is a different pace and schedule for getting things done here, but we are slowly making progress. I brought a small plaster model of the sculpture with me and the plan is to scale this up to a full scale replica of the final design. These will be made of plaster, chicken wire, and steel. This is then used to make a mold for casting the shapes in bronze.

The objective is to create two - large twenty four feet tall rock like structures which will represent the mother and father. A smaller nine foot piece will represent the child figure. They will be cast in ten to twelve tons of bronze. I will be doing fund raising in order to have the pieces brought back to Canada by ship. (Donations would be welcome.)

The sculpture will then be trucked up to Hudson's Hope eventually and welded together in place at the center of my Peace Sanctuary design. I have no timetable, but we expect to have the Baghdad foundary work completed in three to four months. It will all take time but I have faith that we will get there eventually - somehow.

I will be here until near the end of Oct. at which point the craftsmen should have the full scale replica built.I will be working on this also. After that, they can do the final work of casting the bronze without me.

I have requested that fragments of American bombs be melted into the bronze material for my sculpture and this will be done. (There is no shortage of bomb material that drops from the sky every day. There have been over eighty thousand flights over Baghdad in the past few years.) The Iraqi people are very friendly and love Canadians. They are very much aware that Canada has said no to support for the bombing. They are resigned to what is going to happen. They ask: What worse can America do than what they have already done to us? The equivelent tonnage of explosives of seven atomic bombs has been dropped on Iraq. There is not one family that has not lost a son, daughter, mother or father. Twenty eight thousand children died in the first eight months of the gulf war. I have been in Baghdad three times now. In 1999 I saw total devastation and human suffering. The hospitals broke my heart. In the spring of 2002 I saw improvements. This trip, I get a feeling that the people actually are starting to have hope for the first time in twelve years. And just as this happens, they are about to see their water supply pipes, sewage pipes, electrical grid, schools and hospitals, ruined once again. Not to mention the tens of thousands of human lives that will be lost again.

My Peace Sanctuary is being created so that people might reflect on some of these things. I want people to understand that when we drop bombs onto families on the other side of the world, we are brutalising and destroying ourselves as much as anyone else.

When future generations feel discouraged and discover my sanctuary, I want them to know that others have been here and left a footprint in the sand. That they are not alone in their despair. Hope can only be realized in the promotion of dialogue and discussion. I hope to add to this story over the coming couple of weeks.

Report from Deryk in Baghdad
(Oct 25, 2002 -- Part Two)

I could easily spend another three months here as I want to follow the project all the way through to the end. But I know that is not possible and that I have been assured that they will supervise it for me. One of Iraq's greatest sculptors has said that he will take on the responsibility and that I have nothing to worry about. He is a very good man. His english is very good and he has taught me a great deal about bronze and also about being an artist. He is from the old school. He is seventy five. The history of bronze casting started in Iraq. No real surprise there really, but it is interesting that it was lost and it was Mr. Mohamad Rennie who revived it and brought it back in the early fifties.He has travelled the world and laughs at how today they pour bronze as if they were dressed for a walk on the moon. He feels that the smoke and danger of the liquid bronze is part of the creative process and should not be isolated from the artists hands and legs. He has the scars to prove it! I am learning so much and have much more to learn. Just when I think I have the process figured out, I see something that puzzles me. Part of the process that doesn't make sense and they have to take me back a few steps and make me understand what I am looking at. It is so primitive but they can cast anything here. Anything.

Material that has been used for centuries is still claimed to be the best and strongest. For example they use a part of the date tree for strands of fibre to make the mold stronger. They say it is still the best.

Even the automotive shops in the area around the foundry have an amazing ability to take everything apart, repair or replace the broken part and get it all together again. Something with a million pieces such as a transmission is simply taken apart on the ground beside everything else that is going on in the street. If they can't get the part they have a thousand little shops with lathes that machine the part to precise requirements and presto. They have the part they need. They are so resourceful and creative. Nothing is wasted. Nothing. Welding shops are everywhere. They can fix anything and do fix it instead of buying a new part. They put our recycling to shame. And they are up to speed with computers and electronic things as well. They are just as comfortable in fixing the inner workings of these things as they are about building a new muffler from scraps.

The people still flock to the streets at night and along the river. Sometimes there is gunfire in the city at night. In the evening, I was sitting having a picnic by the Tigres, and we watched hot bullets stream over our heads into the sky. I don't know where they fall to the ground but I assume they do somewhere and are harmless. The true meaning of "surreal" struck me. We drank our tea.

There is a younger, more adventurous group that comes out at night and they know how to have fun. They hang on the sides of cars and trucks and shout and sing. They are full of life and daring. All males

I have been to some parts of Baghdad that are much more upscale than most of the areas one sees. The media generaly reports that these places are so exotic and rich. I had a delicious icecream cone at one of these very nice restuarants and it still struck me as being very rough by our standards. There are mercedes and other nice cars in these parts but not the way the media portrays it for us. When you walk around the corner to the side streets you still find modest homes by our standards with scruffy children playing simple games on the dusty road

Chicken Cordon Blue in one of these "nice' restuarants is around three or four dollars. It is beyond the reach of most Iraqi's. You can fill up the tank of your car for one dollar. Half that price if you get the cheap stuff. A taxi ride around the city costs about fifty cents for an average trip of twenty minutes. I had a small pizza the other night and it cost me about one dollar and fifty cents.

There is so much more hope here than in previous trips. But also the cloud of war is above them at all times. Nothing new. Many Iraqi's have had this over their heads most of their adult lives. The bombing has not stopped since the gulf war. They have a tremendous spiritual connection to God. They know who he is. And it gives them strength.

Report from Deryk in Baghdad
(Nov 1, 2002 -- Part Three)

The full scale, 24foot steel forms are almost completed. They are made from three quarter inch steel reinforcing bars. We still have three days to complete this stage before we can start the plaster surface. I have to extend my trip for several more days. Working on this art project, in these times, under these circumstances, has been very difficult on my family. I miss my children and wife very much. Progress has been slow.

But it has to be done right. It is impossible to rush. The following story is an example of why I am trying to complete my project the best way I know how. Yesterday I went to the Baghdad Children's hospital and I took the imprints of some of the children's hands in plaster. I will then place these handprints onto the surface of my sculpture. These children are dying of luekemia. Their hands felt hot to the touch. The doctor in charge explained that it is still very difficult to import the cancer drugs on a consistant basis because of the embargo. Apparently, the arguement is that the cancer drugs could be used for military purposes in weapons of mass destruction. So... these children do not get the cancer medicine when needed. The doctors stressed how imprtant it is for the treatment to be given on a regular basis, with no breaks. But it just doesn't happen. The last time I went into this hospital was in 1999.

At that time, I came away with my heart broken. I could see the suffering of the children. This visit was a little easier for me. I felt that through my art project, I could give these small children a voice. The world was going to hear about their pain, at least in a small way. The mothers and fathers of the children understood what I was trying to do. They wanted their dying children's handprints to form part of the bronze sculpture.

It was a difficult time for them but they wanted people to remember their children in this way. I view the placement of these children's handprints on my bronze sculpture as a positive thing. It is not meant to point blame. I do not want us to forget these children. When my sculpture is successfully completed and it is brought to Canada and installed in my Peace Sanctuary, I want visiting children to place their hands into the handprints of these children from Baghdad and to feel close to them. I want their spirits and scents to mingle. That is my dream.

We are behind schedule for many reasons and it didn't help matters when they had a large fire at the factory. No one was hurt. The propane tanks feeding the heat for melting the wax out of the moulds caught fire and then that quickly spread to the roof. Things got a little out of hand. They had about a dozen propane tanks on fire all at once.

No explosions, but lots of fire. I don't know why they didn't explode because there was so much heat and flames. No one was injured but it was frightening to say the least. No time to get it on video. I do have videos of the furnace and the screaming flames that are produced while they melted down some of the large missile shells. You throw in the shell over the top of the roaring flames. It lands into the one foot hole at the top if your aim and nerves are good and it sits there sticking up for a short moment and then melts down like a block of ice in hot water. The heat is incredible.

Thank you.