Passion: the word that springs instantly to mind the moment you meet Ama Menec. The atmosphere in her studio just outside Totnes is serene. The walls and shelves are covered with beautiful artworks: ceramics and paintings, bronze sculptures and fresh clay pots. But don’t let the serenity fool you. Beneath all the beauty is a barely restrained rage against animal cruelty and the ongoing wholesale destruction of the non-human world. And she has a clear and focused intention to do something about it. Her chosen method is to speak out through art, and her art is wildlife sculpture. Having moved from ceramics into bronze, she now produces exquisite life-size works, particularly of birds.
The subtle, mottled patina of her work is created in close cooperation with the foundry by burning pigments onto the surface of the bronze.
Ama Menec with a life sized Female Buzzard sculpture at the Royal Academy Open in 2015
“It’s a lot like glazing in ceramics,” she says. With all her deep concerns about the environment, I questioned her use of bronze, which requires the mining of both copper and tin – neither of which are environmentally sustainable or impact-free. Clearly uncomfortable about this she argued that, in order to replicate the extreme thinness of wings and feathered limbs, a very strong material is essential.
“It’s really important to make accurate, life-size representations,” she continues. “People think buzzards, for example, will kill livestock, such as lambs, and that’s why they’re persecuted. By making detailed, accurate sculptures, I’m able to show people that they just don’t have the equipment. Their feet just aren’t big enough or strong enough and they don’t have the talons for it.”
She’s an obvious expert in the materials she uses and is determined to use her work for education and conservation; they’re clearly not just expensive ornaments for the wealthy – even at £7,000 a pop.
She’s also embracing modern technology by using 3D laser-scanning and printing to produce smaller-scaled polymer replicas of many of her bronze and ceramic pieces for people with less money to spend.
The quality of her art is undeniable and her work is becoming increasingly recognised nationally. Her bronze Female Buzzard was recently exhibited at the Scottish Royal Academy and she has forthcoming exhibitions at the Art Garden Show in Woodbury in June and the Hendon Festival in July.
She first became politicised by persistent and vicious homophobia at art college.
“I spent more time at the women’s centre over the road than I did in the studio,” she says.
She now draws clear links between the blood-sports fraternity, badger culling, the Tory front bench and the recently announced end of the Wildlife Crime Unit, which means fox-hunting will continue unchallenged by the law – particularly hunts like the Heythrop from Chipping Norton, which boasts David Cameron as a member.
“The police just won’t touch them because of Cameron,” she seethes, outraged in obvious frustration. “And there’s an increasing body of evidence which shows that men who enjoy cruelty to animals are also more likely to be violent towards women and children.”
As I sip the black vanilla tea I was offered – as a committed vegan, she won’t have milk on the premises – I’m imbued with a strong sense that there’s far more to her work than meets the eye.Go and see for yourself.
Richard Elliot
Courtesy of The PRSD