Frank Bruce: The Privilege of Being
By Madina Burkhanova
Let us take a little sensory trip: you hear the gentle stirrings of creatures, moving subtly and surely in a way that we humans never could in our metropolises. Your olfactory senses are more awake than ever; the dew is fresh and the humidity is a pleasant weight on your shoulders. You are out of your depth entirely, and maybe you should feel fear, but instead you’re imbued with a profound sense of peace. Life has an inexplicable simplicity here. In this forest, birth and death are an untouchable cycle, all the little bits and bobs that come in between those two things falling away and leaving you with only life and decay. Amidst the greenery that engulfs you, there is a face - not one made of flesh and blood, but a tormented one carved into the Scots pine trees that frequent the area. You look further, and there is another one - and another! It is the stuff of dreams, but simultaneously material for your worst nightmares.
Frank Bruce, Untitled, c. 2003-2007, deadwood, Inshriach forest.
Where you are now in the Cairngorms’ Inshriach forest is where Frank Bruce once stood, positioning his plethora of wooden sculptures. The youngest of nine, there was little to suggest that the Aberdeenshire native would one day become a prolific artist. Bruce’s determination made itself very apparent from a young age, though; having taught himself to read through comic books, his love for literature fostered a fascination with Greek sculpture that would carry through to his adult life. An excerpt from his primary school diary reads: “The most beautiful thing is the sun setting on a Sunday night. The clouds were like mountains and the sky was like lochs and the sun shining on them.” While grammatically lacking, Bruce’s words breathe life into the mundane. This is a trait of his that he carries into his sculptures - haunting pieces known for their poignance and visual impact.
Bruce was not a patriot, at least not in a fundamentally political way. His inspiration for sculptures was dimensional, but at the root of his artistic incentive was his love for Scotland. However, he shunned the subcategory of patriotism that aligned with violence - patriots who were willing to go to war. Touched by Robert Burns’ poem A Man’s A Man For A’ That, Bruce was quietly devoted to his country and advocated for the working class wherever and whenever he could. A piece from the forest titled The Man’s The Gowd, gowd being the Scots translation of gold, features the conjoined figures of a worker and a knight. They are locked in an eternal staring match: two sculptures of equal stature, perhaps representative of two warring sides of Bruce’s character.
Frank Bruce, The Man’s the Gowd, c. 2003-2007, deadwood, Inshriach forest.
The artist’s sociopolitical commentary is evident, sometimes explicitly, in many of his forest sculptures. His sculpture The Onlooker features an individual swinging a weapon towards a figure opposite; at the scene of the crime, we as the spectators are rendered the onlookers.
Frank Bruce, The Onlooker, c. 2003-2007, deadwood, Inshriach forest.
The kind of violence that Bruce depicts is not a characteristic of his nature but more a manifestation of his grieving. Although he kept private the specific backstories of many of his sculptures, his piece The Sailor is profoundly personal. It was inspired by the death of the artist's brother, who was trapped on a sinking World War II battleship. Perhaps this is also his reasoning for condemning patriotism that parallels itself with war. The sculpture is joined by an inscription that reads “I was privileged to be.” Unlike his wooden sculptures, the stone-sculpture sailor is destined to last a great deal longer.
Frank Bruce, The Sailor, c. 2003-2007, stone, Inshriach forest.
The commentary that Bruce implicitly makes with his sculptures is abundant and could prompt a massive amount of study, but it is also important to acknowledge the physical marvel of some of his sculptures on a practical level. The Walker stands eight metres tall, dominating the forest floor on which it stands. Its stance is eerie, and viewers are able to walk under and through it.
Frank Bruce, The Walker, c. 2003-2007, deadwood, Inshriach forest.
Appreciators of Bruce’s craft worldwide are in despair; his wooden sculptures continue to rot away and return to the forest floor with every passing moment. I, too, feel stung when I imagine his beautiful work ceasing to exist, and in all honesty, the idea that they are simply returning to nature provides little consolation. This was Bruce’s intention, his bigger picture. The artist was devoted to the concept of life and death cycling in nature’s own way; birth and decay were ideas to accept, not avoid. Each sculpture will have its own departure time and its own individual journey - this was his vision.
Much like his sculptures, Frank Bruce was dedicated to living his life in accordance with nature’s cycles. He was a gentle man, intent on manifesting his love for Scotland through his craft. Even after his works gained global renown, he rejected any sort of spotlight or fiscal revenue from the sculptures. The sculptures above were all created in the privacy of his own property and only moved to the forest by the Banff council when he was convinced that they were, in fact, worthy of the public eye. In the wake of his success he still remained tentative on the quality of his work, a modest man through and through. Bruce was the picture of humility and devotion, and having passed away in 2010, he is survived by his wife Mabel and his children and grandchildren. To know him was to be in the presence of peace and magic; a man who was incentivised by nothing other than pure love.
Then let us pray that come it may,
As come it will for a’ that,
That Sense and Worth, o’er a’ the earth
Shall bear the gree an’ a’ that.
For a’ that, an’ a’ that,
It’s comin yet for a’ that,
That Man to Man the warld o’er
Shall brithers be for a’ that.
Final stanza of “A Man’s A Man For A’ That,“ Robert Burns.
Works Cited
Burns, Robert. A Man’s A Man For A’ That. Scottish Poetry Library, 1795.
Frank Bruce Sculpture Trail. Frank Bruce Sculpture Trail. 2023. http://www.frank-bruce.org.uk/.
Frank Bruce Sculpture Trail. Obituary: Frank Bruce. The Scotsman, 24th September 2009.http://www.frank-bruce.org.uk/frank_bruce_obituary_8.html.
Strathspey & Badenoch Herald. “Frank Bruce Sculpture Hit by Ravages of Time.” Highland News and Media Ltd., 1st November 2019. https://www.strathspey-herald.co.uk/news/feshie-art-trail-hit-by-ravages-of-time-185420/
The Newsroom. “Frank Bruce Obituary.” National World Publishing Ltd., 24th September 2009. https://www.scotsman.com/news/obituaries/frank-bruce-2443363.