Lary Bloom
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Tuesday, February 21, 2006
Icy Stares
And so to our little town comes X-rated ice scupture. Perhaps I overstate this. It was only a body. But what a body.Used to be that ice sculpture competition was decided by who carved the best American eagle. No more. The level of sophistication has hugely increased.
And so when Chester, Connecticut, invited eleven competitors for this years Winter Carnival, there was much antipation. I recalled my favorite from years past -- a carving of an outfielder's glove. Timing is everything. And a comment on baseball and the beginning of spring training was just the warm touch needed on 28-degree afternoon.
This year's bunch was less-springlike, but impressive, and an entirely new dimension. Used to be that contestants carved from a single block of ice -- not anymore. One adventuresome fellow set out to re-create the Parthenon, but settled in the end for Stonehenge. Another created a lion wrapped in a serpent. I was relieved, I guess, that no one had tried to carve the Prophet Mohammed.
Unless that was the name of showstopper -- the sensual and captivating body of, what? A dancer? A women in the act of something in which the usual venue is the bedroom? With his power saw, and a cigaret dangling from his lips, the sculptor carved away, or should I say curved away? He was enormously successful, particular in the upper regions of the body.
I did not stick around for the blue ribbon ceremony, or to exactly where, on that anatomy, he hung it from.
Posted by:Lary Bloom at 6:17 PM
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