When I realized that my spirit has a helper, I started to wonder if my mind has eyes.

— Robert Davidson’s description of this work, 1996

Robert Davidson (Guud Sans Glans) began working in bronze as a possible medium for public art commissions in the mid 1980s. While visiting the site that would become a commission for three totem poles titled Three Variations of the Killer Whale Myth at the Donald M. Kendell Sculpture Garden, Pepsico World Headquarters in Purchase, New York, Davidson carried a wooden frog medallion in his pocket, which he famously described as squirming and trying to leap into the pond in front of the poles. This led to a commission for a three-foot bronze casting in which the “medallion” floats just above the surface of the pond. Davidson decided to experiment with smaller bronze editions to maintain market presence during a decade in which his work was in extremely high demand. He would leave bronze as a medium in favour of hollow aluminum sculptures, which he could adjust in scale from tabletop to monumental works that could withstand Canadian winters in public spaces.

Gary Wyatt