A history Of War

Dale Copeland
‘A History of War’
Assemblage of found objects
300 x 300 x 150mm

“It goes around. And around. Kings and queens, all different. Handcarved chess pieces marching off to fight

As always, the pawns, foot soldiers, young men in front. Kings and bishops in behind. The badges and coins .... loyalty to country and money to be made & kept. From many different countries, belief systems, languages & symbols.

In my big studio clean-up I found the rotating wooden thing, gambling chips in the round holes, packs of cards in the slots. Playing, wondering how to use it, I noticed that packs of cards use different images for the kings and queens. Different clothes, different faces (you'd be surprised to see how grumpy several of the queens look!)

I filled the slots with shaped wood to support the marching chess pieces.”

Dale Copeland describes herself as a mathematician-turned-artist. The one time head of a college maths and physics department and freelance computer programmer, Copeland, at the age of forty-three opted for a new lifestyle devoted to art and motherhood. She is now a 6th Dan black belt in Taekwon-Do and is still training regularly. Dale has often been referred to as the back bone of the Taranaki arts community, she is currently the driving force behind the artist collective called Virtual TART which shows their work online through the Virtual TART site www.tart.co.nz. In 2012 Dale was appointed a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to the arts. Dale lives at Puniho with painter Paul Hutchinson.