[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 186 (Tuesday, November 27, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Pages S7104-S7105]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



    Recognizing a New Ceres Statue for the Vermont State House Dome

  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, this Friday, November 30, at noon, 
Vermonters will be gathering to see a large crane carefully hoist a 
14\1/2\-foot carved statue of Ceres, the goddess of agriculture, atop 
the newly gilded dome of the statehouse in Montpelier. I was born in 
Montpelier, and I am proud of this because it is going to be a great 
moment for our State and for everyone involved in the project, which 
has captured the attention of not only Vermonters but of those who have 
been following the project from great distances with the help of social 
media.
  The new version of Ceres replaces a 1938 replica of the original 
statue that was removed last April after too many severe Vermont 
winters took a toll on the wood figure. Since that time, Vermont 
artists Jerry Williams and Chris Miller have been hard at work creating 
the new Ceres, first sculpting a model and then, out of a big piece of 
mahogany, they chiseled the final mahogany figure.
  Marcelle and I and my sister Mary, along with David Schutz, had the 
pleasure of visiting the Vermont Granite Museum in Barre, VT, a few 
months back to witness Mr. Miller at work.
  I am the grandson of two stone carvers. One of my grandfathers 
immigrated to Vermont from Italy. The other, my Irish grandfather, 
carved stone in Barre. So it was a thrill to see how Mr. Miller used 
the original tools of the trade.
  He took raw wood and turned it into the fine details we now see, from 
Ceres' flowing robes to the distinctive veins in her hands. It was 
really remarkable to see this hunk of wood turn into a real person.
  Both artists learned their techniques by studying in the studios of 
Barre's stone carvers. It is a specialized art that requires intense 
dedication, patience, skill, and practice. We are so fortunate that 
artists such as these have carried on a tradition that makes Vermonters 
proud.
  It reminds me of the times as a child when I would go in and watch 
stone carvers at work in Barre, where my father was born, and watch 
them turn stone into pieces of pure art.
  In this case they are using wood. Incidentally, the reason the statue 
is made out of wood instead of stone is that wood weighs less, and 
there is only so much weight the dome can hold.
  I grew up in a home across the street from the Vermont State House. 
Ceres was always in our sights. Walking to school, coming back from 
school, doing my paper route, and being out with my brother and sister 
and my parents, we would always see Ceres. She is a strong figure, one 
that befits a State where farming and soil and hard work are so closely 
linked to our lives.
  Frankly, over the past few months, when I have been home in Vermont, 
going by the statehouse and seeing it without Ceres has been odd 
because it has always been part of my life. So this Vermonter and 
Vermonters like my wife Marcelle and others are going to be glad to 
have her back.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that this November 10 article 
from the Barre, VT, Times Argus, profiling these two sculptors be 
printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                 [From the Times Argus, Nov. 10, 2018]

     For the Love of Carving: Jerry Williams and Chris Miller Earn 
                           Governor's Honors

                             (By B. Amore)

       Jerry Williams and Chris Miller are united in their love of 
     the ancient craft of carving. It is this common love that has 
     brought them together as a team in creating the 14.5-foot 
     statue of Ceres for the Vermont State House dome. This 
     project, and their separate accomplishments, have won them 
     the 2018 prestigious Governor's Award for Excellence in the 
     Arts, which will be presented by Gov. Phil Scott at the State 
     House Nov. 14.
       Carving, a reductive process that was once part of every 
     classical sculptor's training, has now become the purview of 
     a discrete selection of artists in the United States. Barre, 
     of course, is a mecca of stone carving, primarily in granite. 
     Its community of skilled carvers who work in the monument 
     trade, as well as executing large public art sculptures and 
     making their own personal work, is a unique resource.
       The native stone of the surrounding region, and the culture 
     of carved sculpture, drew both Williams and Miller, albeit by 
     different paths. Williams talks of attending the art program 
     at Johnson State College and being the only one interested in 
     learning clay sculpture. It was at a time when conceptual 
     work and mixed media held sway in the art world, but he was 
     interested in learning the basics of sculpture. In order to 
     learn ``real'' sculpture at the source, he set up an 
     internship with Frank Gaylord, who trained a generation of 
     Barre sculptors. That internship turned into a job and a life 
     in granite.
       Eventually, Williams founded his own shop, the Barre 
     Sculpture Studio. He talks of belonging to a ``lineage'' in 
     the sense of the classical studio system that exists in 
     Carrara, Italy, and that was brought to Barre and to the 
     Vermont Marble Company in Proctor in the 19th century.
       Generally, a well-known sculptor would create a model and 
     the expert carvers in the sculpture studios would then 
     execute it. ``Youth Triumphant,'' a Barre monument depicting 
     a young warrior pleading for world peace, was carved by Gino 
     Enrico Tosi, Enrico Mori and John Delmonte from a model 
     created by famous New York sculptor C. Paul Jennewein. 
     Williams is one of the few sculptors in Barre who creates his 
     own model for a commission and then sees it through to 
     execution in his studio.
       Miller began woodcarving independently in 1976 while 
     studying art at Southern Connecticut State University and 
     Southern Vermont College in Bennington. Although he is 
     largely self-taught, he worked with the sculptors Lothar 
     Werslin and Billy Brauer of Vermont to hone his skills in 
     drawing, sculpture, and anatomy. For his first 25 years as a 
     working artist, he carved only in wood.
       Living in Calais, in Barre's shadow, it was inevitable that 
     Miller would eventually carve stone. Finding his way to the 
     studios of several Barre sculptors, he learned the rudiments 
     of stone carving, and since then has been working in wood and 
     stone, doing both public commissions and personal work.
       According to Miller, Williams' classical studies have 
     enabled him to become one of the best figurative sculptors in 
     Vermont. As Miller meticulously carves the Ceres statue in 
     wood, he is constantly taking measurements from Williams' 
     exquisite model.
       Williams is a consummate artist and craftsman, and builds 
     his models from the inside out, beginning with a metal 
     armature, layered over with clay to create a nude body, then 
     layering clothing on that. His knowledge of anatomy underlies 
     the figure, giving it a much more realistic sense than most 
     contemporary sculptors are able to achieve with less rigorous 
     means. Miller's own anatomy studies enhance the liveliness of 
     his carving so that there is an incredible flow to Ceres' 
     robes--something that is very evident in the supine form that 
     is near completion at the Vermont Granite Museum in Barre.
       Miller's portraits in wood are incredibly sensitive. The 
     character of the individuals shines through the seemingly 
     obdurate material. Miller is imbued with a love of carving 
     and speaks of feeling relaxed and joyous at the end of a day 
     of work. His portrait piece ``Stanley Fitch,'' complete with 
     eyeglasses carved on the face, feels like an integral part of 
     his subject's personality.
       The elderly farmer, ``Percy,'' and the couple, ``Howard and 
     Dot,'' are more expressive and personal than a photograph or 
     a painting. The character of each person seems alive before 
     our eyes, under Miller's sensitive strokes. The flow of the 
     lines of carving, all done by hand, follow the form as 
     intimately as a sculptor's fingers working clay. This is an 
     extraordinary achievement and a real legacy creation for many 
     generations.
       Most of Miller's personal work in granite and marble is 
     figurative. The female form seems to be of endless 
     inspiration to him. He has also joined forces with other 
     sculptors who have an ongoing project at the Millstone Hill 
     Sculpture Park on the site of the old Websterville quarry. 
     There is a plentiful supply of grey Barre granite, and one 
     never knows when one of Miller's trolls or Hephaestus, the 
     god of fire, might emerge from an old quarry block. Another 
     popular work is a sculptural truck that Miller built, with 
     community support, that resides in Maple Corner, Calais.
       Miller doesn't see much of a difference between public and 
     private work. He approaches them with the same spirit. With 
     personal sculptures shown in galleries, he never knows where 
     they will end up. With a public art piece, the area has to be 
     researched, and the artist has to come up with an idea that 
     is relevant. For one commission in Marion, Iowa, a bike-
     centric community, Miller designed a bike rack supported by 
     granite gloves carved from the town's photos. One of his bike 
     racks featuring gargoyles engaged in an eternal tug of war 
     graces Barre's North Main Street.
       Williams' approach to working with clients on public 
     commissions is a genuinely collaborative one, whether he is 
     working on a

[[Page S7105]]

     memorial sculpture for a family grieving over the loss of 
     their infant daughter or a 10-foot-high granite Teddy bear 
     for Highland Park in Dallas, Texas. His modus operandi is 
     consistently professional, beginning with drawings, moving 
     towards a clay model, then the final execution in stone 
     using diamond saws and pneumatic tools powered by air. For 
     the Barre City and Elementary School, Williams chose to 
     create a collection of freestanding Teddy bears tumbling 
     playfully in one of the sculptural niches at the school.
       Williams admits that the challenge of running a carving 
     business and creating personal work is not an easy one. He's 
     not sure that there is a ``happy medium,'' and often feels 
     that he is ``stealing time'' to make personal work. His 
     personal work is often carved granite and mixed media. Two 
     pieces that demonstrate this are ``Argon,'' a split sphere, 
     combining high polish and texture that contains a line of 
     blue argon gas. ``Neon,'' a linear piece with a mysterious, 
     mask-like face, is illuminated with a center of red. Williams 
     loves the effect of the light energy contrasting with the 
     density of the stone. Other pieces are always 
     representational, but not figurative. The work ``Warm Gun'' 
     is a tour de force of softly draped fabric covering a form 
     that reveals itself as a gun only after close inspection.
       Williams and Miller belong to a group of sculptors who 
     believe in collaboration. At times, an artist is awarded a 
     commission and will come to Williams to create the model. If 
     Williams or Miller needs help on a larger project, they may 
     bring in one or two other carvers. Large-scale sculpture 
     takes a cooperative effort, and it is this spirit of sharing 
     between Williams and Miller that animates the Ceres project. 
     They both tell of a chance meeting at LBJ's store in 
     Worcester and discussing the requirements for the Ceres 
     sculpture. It was that informal conversation that led them to 
     the path of creating a proposal together to apply for the 
     commission.
       Williams was involved in the early days of the Barre 
     Sculptors and Artisans Guild, a loose affiliation of Barre 
     carvers who were also creating their own personal sculpture. 
     What began as a Friday afternoon gathering to drink beer 
     together at Gaylord's studio blossomed into a group that 
     showed their work together. Their first show filled Williams' 
     studio in 1986. Some of those carvers still participate in 
     the annual Stone Show at Studio Place arts.
       Williams also participated in the Burlington International 
     Sculpture Symposium organized by University of Vermont 
     professor and sculptor Paul Aschenbach. The intense six-week 
     symposium resulted in a park on the site of the Moran 
     Municipal Generation Station, which endured for 23 years. 
     Local sculptors worked with sculptors from Japan, Germany, 
     Czechoslovakia, Scotland, the Netherlands and Romania to 
     create a people-friendly environment that has been 
     temporarily dismantled and hopefully awaits a second 
     installation in Burlington's redesigned waterfront area.
       Sue Higby, director of Barre's Studio Place Arts (SPA), has 
     supported the personal work of Barre carvers by hosting the 
     annual Stone Show at SPA. She has also been a key mover in 
     the execution of public projects in Barre, including 
     developing and securing funding for the Stone Sculpture 
     Legacy Program, which was supported initially by the Charles 
     Semprebon Fund. It was Higby who approached Miller with the 
     idea of creating a site-specific piece in a narrow space 
     between Studio Place Arts and Barre City Place. The resulting 
     ``Unzipping the Earth,'' simultaneously a sculpture and a 
     garden, was designed and executed by Miller, and won the 2014 
     American Society of Landscape Architects Merit Award for 
     Public Places.
       Both Miller and Williams are outstanding examples of the 
     creativity and perseverance that marks sculptors who carve 
     stone or wood. In dealing with an obdurate material, one has 
     to have an eternally flexible attitude--a willingness to work 
     with the stone, not in competition with it--a willingness to 
     bend the carving to follow the flow of the grain of the wood 
     or stone.
       Vermont is fortunate to count these seasoned professionals 
     among the ranks of its profuse community of artists. They are 
     exemplars of artists who have followed their individual 
     paths, and have succeeded in creating exceptional works of 
     art in both the public and private sphere. They have given 
     generously to their communities, and richly deserve the 
     Governor's Award for Excellence in the Arts.

  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.