Barn Owl Sculpture

Barn Owl Sculpture carved in Hazeldean Sandstone

Over the last few months it has been busy with Barn Owls, I’ve seen them in flight quartering the fields and returning with food for youngsters, and more recently the new-fledged owlets making their first tentative explorations of the world beyond the nest box.

Though these initial flights appear rather haphazard and ungainly, (suggesting nothing of the adult bird’s smooth elegance), these Barn Owls still make me feel clumsy, awkward.  Watching them in the meadow I’m struck by their effortless grace, each advance deliberate, each motion essential.

Barn Owl sculpture – an owl perched and looking over its shoulder

I’m thinking about when I’m carving to make their shape – all that huffing and puffing, struggle, fumbling, pushing, imbalance, argument and frustration.  Even when things go a little bit right, my elation is cloddish by comparison.

The Hazeldean Sandstone that the Barn Owl sculpture is carved in has perfect natural mottled brown markings

Can I learn to be more instinctive?  Can I just abandon myself and be wild as an owl?

Today I’m trying to move with greater ease and at least learn that lesson from my owls.