Salome

Salome: bronze, 26cm high

Salome's story is from the Old Testament, reinterpreted by Oscar Wilde, and in music by Richard Strauss. Salome is a beautiful but wicked girl who revels in her power over her stepfather, King Herod. When Herod lusted after her, she at first refused his request to dance for him. Only when he promises Salome anything at all does she agree. But what she asks for is John the Baptist's head on a platter.

Where Botticelli and others decorated the hair of beautiful women with strings of pearls, Salome's are decorated too. Here they are not pearls, but something more sinister, the teeth of small animals. (Actually these ones are the teeth of fruit bats. They are cast at Pangolin Editions, the owner of which, Runwe Kingdon, collects animal skulls).