This volume is the first monograph devoted to Woods Davy and collects the works made by the artist from 1978 to the present, highlighting their context, the stories connected to their creation, and the artistic development to which they bear witness. Woods’s growth is in fact marked by an evolution: his early practice is characterised by bold architectural abstractions and monumental installations, while his later work possesses a more reflective character. These latter pieces are compositions of smooth, rounded stones that appear to float in the air, defying gravity. The publication also focuses on an in-depth analysis of his Cantamar series. However, Woods’s work also draws upon ideas derived from his passion for art collecting, in particular the masks used by the Songye and Luba peoples that inhabit the south eastern regions of the Democratic Republic of Congo. He in fact owns what is certainly the most important private collection of Kifwebe masks. The connection between these two poles around which Woods’s life revolves is quite simple: in both there is a negation of the natural order. On the one hand, stones float like clouds, while on the other, men are transformed into a hybrid of human, animal, and spirit.

The Fire of Heaven presents the work of Enrique Martínez Celaya in conversation with the life and work of the influential twentieth-century California poet Robinson Jeffers. Despite existing in different lifetimes, Jeffers’ approach to life as art and his reverence for the natural beauty of the California coastline inextricably link the uncompromising poet to Celaya. The artist’s multi-faceted practice explores the map of a territory shaped by self, memory, ideations of home, exile, myth, and identity. His practice presumes art should be an ethical effort that aims to understand better and be engaged with the world and ourselves. Beyond these threads of commonality, Celaya draws from specific Jeffers’ writings, such as the 1928 poem The Summit Redwood, which serves as the exhibition’s namesake and describes “the fire from heaven” as a force untamed and ignited at whim. Celaya’s work created during his stay at the poet’s landmark home in Carmel-by-the-Sea is complemented by Jeffers’ handwritten poems, notes, and photographs.