Artist: Rob Lentz
Title: Amanda After Arcimboldo
Description: One of a kind Keep A Breast cast sculpture
Year created: 2020
Medium: Acrylic and Paper collage on plaster
Edition: 1 of 1
Height (inches): 11
Width (inches): 12
Depth (inches): 9
Signed by the artist
Signed Area: back
Description of piece:
One of a kind Keep A Breast cast of Amanda Little painted by Rob Lentz.
Artist bio:
BUST: AMANDA LITTLE "The casting sesh was unalloyed hyper-pure high-octane femme power. Shaney Jo is a visionary and a hugely generous team player -- there are so few people who know how to be both. She brings joy to these sessions -- exactly the sensibility we need to prevail over breast cancer. Let's fight the pain with pleasure; let's heal the hurt with joy; let's elevate the science with art."
ARTIST: ROB LENTZ "I would do just about anything for Amanda Little. In addition to being friends, I've had the honor of collaborating with her on previous projects related to her writing on food, energy, and climate change. Trying to keep up with Amanda's curiosity and enthusiasm is always an adventure. So when she asked me to paint her breasts, I said, "Sure."
Amanda's latest book, The Fate of Food, is a deep dive into what we eat. Apples figure prominently in her reporting, where they come to symbolize our ancient and complex relationship with agriculture.
I borrowed the idea for Amanda's cast from Giuseppe Arcimboldo (1527 – 1593), an Italian-born court painter who specialized in allegorical portraits composed of fruits, vegetables, and sea creatures. Both still life and portrait, Arcimboldo's bizarre work would inspire the Surrealists of the 20th Century. Arcimboldo's work's true weirdness is a product of the artist's wild imagination and hyper-realistic skill: his subjects look not just realistic, but good enough to eat.
I took Arcimboldo's idea of still life as portraiture and applied it to Amanda's cast in the form of apples, which in this case are photographed and collaged over the plaster form. On the inside of the cast is an "X-ray" image of an apple that reveals its magical seed—an allegory of art and science and an early cover design commissioned for The Fate of Food. This work is my homage to Amanda, whose insatiable hunger for knowledge is matched only by her infectious desire to share it.
The Keep A Breast cast is a canvas, but it's not a blank one. I took up the challenge to honor my friend, to exalt the many women in my life who have been affected by breast cancer, and hopefully to inspire my ten-year-old daughter."