Metro Dmytriw

Manitoba   

Biography

I grew up in Flin Flon, Manitoba, graduated from the University of Manitoba and worked in resource-related and scientific institutions in western Canada. During this time, I had a go at the various sculpture media with no particular purpose other than the enjoyment it gave me. 

As I think most sculptors do, I like to have motion in my pieces. To put some extra feeling into the pieces, I exaggerate proportions here and there. I like to get away from details now and again - particularly in my woods - and there especially, I look for the line and aspect (pose) to suggest a feeling or an atmosphere for the piece. I like to start a piece from an idea. Sometimes this comes from something read or heard or just an idea that happens. For example, Peasant Dance: work-worn and stiffened, they can still find joy and express it in a somewhat clumsy, slightly off-balance and perhaps embarrassed dance. I also like to do pieces to express others' ideas and feelings. A friend in Winnipeg who is in the steel business wanted something for his board room table that would pay tribute to the "builders of the west" as he called them, since he often has foreign visitors. We talked for a while and ended up doing a piece of a farmer stooking grain as his father had done because that represented the kind of hard work that underlies all we have today.