Death Mask Of The Robot

This piece was almost finished at the time of my health issue. I've finessed it some since feeling better. Most notable change was my lightening the mask itself. I had it rather dull and gun-metallish but thought it too dark and lifeless in comparison to the base. I mixed some white, yellow ochre and portrait pink thinly to make a wash which still allowed the grey to show through but brightened the piece over all. Death Mask Of The Robot stands 19 inches tall, 8 inches wide and 3.75 inches deep. Robot is drawn from an old Church Slavonic word, robota, for “servitude,” “forced labor” or “drudgery.” The word, which also has cognates in German, Russian, Polish and Czech, was a product of the central European system of serfdom by which a tenant’s rent was paid for in forced labor or service. As a word, robot is a relative newcomer to the English language. It was the brainchild of a brilliant Czech playwright, novelist and journalist named Karel Capek (1880-1938) who introduced it in his 1920 hit play, R.U.R., or Rossum’s Universal Robots. You don't have to be purely mechanical to understand and experience 'forced labor' or 'drudgery,' now do you? Original Jones Art nods his head in northwest Austin, Texas.