Welded steel, 72 x 46 x 40, 1999.
A honky-tonk is a cheap bar with live music, and the name also belongs to the piano kept there: a battered upright, usually a little out of tune and played hard, whose tinny sound became a style. The sculpture is that piano in steel. A tall plate with a curved face rises behind the keyboard as the case does on an upright, with a flat lid, a ring on top and a drawer with two pulls below. Where the keys would be, a shallow tray is divided into compartments, a row of small boxes in place of a row of keys. A round stool is fixed beneath it, a small pedal sits at the foot, and a thin leg with a curved brace holds up the right end.
The honky-tonk sound comes from a piano that is rough, blunt and worn, and the sculpture has that look. It is rust-brown, hard-edged and plain, with no polish, and even its handles are bare rings. The parts of an upright are all present as furniture: case, lid, drawer, stool, pedal. A piano of this kind is judged by its sound, and a steel one cannot make any, so the sound comes from the title and the form carries its appearance.
