There was no practical reason for the grimaces facing me. Not only were there grimaces, but leers, smiles, and a host of empty stares. And these were not just human visages – there were a host of strange creatures: monkeys, dragons, donkeys, a griffin or two, as well as a handful of beasts rendered unidentifiable by erosion.
Penn’s Quadrangle, an impressive brick dormitory on the college of the University of Pennsylvania, is covered with gargoyles. And gargoyles – from the french gargouille, meaning throat – were originally meant to be rain troughs to channel the water away from a building.
But these were here purely for the whimsy. Their function seemed only to entertain. And sitting on a bench by the grand entrance of the dorm, I was more than entertained. They enthralled me. I couldn’t sit long, since I had to encircle the entire building and capture a line-up of the squat, yet somehow acrobatic, figures.
Returning to my bench, I began to consider the task facing the creator of these. It was a very constricting assignment. I could just hear the explanation: “Yo, Michael! Yo, Angelo! We’ll give you, like, a hunnert of these sculptures to do, but ya gotta fit them into this square or fuggeddaboudit.” (Exactly when did Philadelphians start talking Fluffian?)
As I tried my hand at sketching my own, I realized how hard it was. Vertical bodies don’t lend themselves to squat, squashed spaces. There is a genius of contortion on display in them. Look for yourself.
More than anything else, however, what got my creative juices flowing was that most wonderful of challenges: theme and variation. I love theme and variation. Create a look, establish a set of rules, construct a framework then play inside that space. Make the space small, make the rules restrictive and the play becomes even more impressive. Like dancing in a phone booth.
Life is full of repeating tight spaces. For me, they’re a bit of an evening free. They’re cramped cross-country flights. They’re whiteboards. And sheets of paper. Part of this pursuit of Benched is to find away to play inside those constrictions, but just like these gargoyles, to play in a way that delights others.
What can one do within our little squares?
I have a very direct application in mind. I’m going to try my hand at these gargoyles. Not carved, though. Drawn. Perhaps I’ll add one to each letter I write to a friend. Without the building around them, without the weathered stone, I suspect they’ll seem a bit arbitrarily compacted, but I’m not going to worry about it. I’m going to play a bit. Let out a bit of whimsy.
Maybe my gargouilles can channel something after all.
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