2008 The Ark

The solid sturdy structure of the sculpture The Ark, carries an association of meanings melding formal qualities of an abstract form with a narrative about the saving of endangered birds, a pressing issue of contemporary times. 

The artwork was made over a period of four or five years, appearing first as a simple rugged form with a perfect sphere balanced on top of a flattened plane. It was altered with cross structures to hold up the shape, the addition of markings and embellishments in weld and a new patina of dark rich blacks against underlying brown. Lastly birds were added onto the structure, perched, appearing as creatures sitting aloft the form.

The shape the birds ride is a vessel of sorts, an odd cross between a plane with small, blunted wings, and a boat, a prow cut with vertical slashes, so it resembles a Pacific comb and a series of dots adorning the hull. It emerged from the sculptor’s oeuvre after a visit to the island of Tanna, off Vanuatu when he saw some of the settlements of the John Frum Movement, a cargo cult originating after World War II when American soldiers brought food and medical supplies to the island. The followers often built fake planes in bush clearings to entice another landing.

But Dibble’s plane structure has been put to more effective use. It is functioning as a raft, a stable carrier for the ball is static, carrying a kiwi, two huia (are they ghosts?) and a kea, onto safe ground linking with the biblical Old Testament story the Department of Conservation’s attempt to take endangered species to islands for protection.