I Totem So, Jim Leedy

Archive Label 2003: Art dealer Jim Morgan commissioned Leedy to make life masks of him a short time before his unexpected death. After Morgan died, Leedy decided to make a memorial piece for him. The artist composed I Totem So out of Morgan’s life casts with his winged head at the top. The two wolves’ heads that flank the sculpture are ancient symbols of power and importance. The unpainted and unglazed clay and its unfinished surface call attention to the process of creation. As in Chinese culture, the white color of the work symbolizes innocence and mourning, an expression of Leedy’s grief about his friend’s death.