"I lived for many years in Yorkshire with four horses
and these two cows, Ernest and Pugley. I was fascinated by the differences
between the cows and horses - how they moved, communicated, and distributed
their weight, which presented very different sculptural opportunities. Ernest
was a half Dexter breed, and Pugley, somewhat smaller, a full Dexter. They were
incredibly close. Pugley was enormously friendly and would gallop across the
field to have his back scratched, which could obviously be alarming if you
didn’t know him. Ernest was far more sceptical and a real escape artist, but
fortunately followed Pugley everywhere. I came across them early one morning
lying like this and couldn’t help but be struck how they resembled a classical
Pietà. Working with very wet clay emphasised the feeling that they were almost
part of the earth." - Jess Wallace