Having tried my hand at sculpture for a period, at the very beginning of my career in art, I developed an understanding of the great skill involved in turning one's vision into a three dimensional form. The evolution of a piece of sculpture, from the germination of an idea in the artist's mind, is to me, a great source of wonder: from its beginnings in the base, formless, raw material; through to the maquette; on to intermediate states and sizes, using various materials and media. Throughout the journey to the finished piece, the sculptor is engaged physically, mentally and spiritually, in an act of creation over many stages.

The process involved in Boaz Vaadia's sculptures requires incredible thought, precision and patience. Hundreds of small slabs are hand chiseled into shape from sheets of highly fragile slate, which are later stacked and secured vertically, to slowly reveal the final figurative form. Vaadia then casts the work in bronze editions. His casting technique is both unusual and traditional, preserving the raw elemental quality and extraordinary texture of the stone, in the tradional sculptor's medium of bronze.

The power of stone and natural elements, and the relation of human beings to that power, determines the content of this exhibition. Vaadia's sculptures are a celebration of primary experiences. Without any pretensions to intellectual ambiguities, they engage us on the level of elemental awareness. Powerful in their communication of the connection of man to earth and nature, and created without individual features or bodily tension, these sculptures convey, in depictions of momentary human existence, a powerful emotional content, together with a strong sense of human sincerity and dignity.

Vaadia s works grace prominent public spaces and private collections around the worls including the Time Warner Building, New YOrk; the Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco; the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; the Isreal Museum, Jerusalem; the Hakone Museum, Hakone; and the private collection of Elton Joh, Georgia. We are grateful to the City of Westminster for allowing our addition to this list: for the duration of the exhibition "Ammi'el" will be exhibited in Berkeley Square, London.

It is with great pleasure that I am able to present these evocative sculptures in an exhibition of Boaz Vaadia's work at Connought Brown.

- London, October 2006