Welded steel, 75 x 27 x 24, 2004.
“A man of the world” is the phrase for someone seasoned and unshockable, at ease in any company. The portrait bust is the format cultures have long used to honor public figures: head and shoulders on a column, raised so the viewer looks up. Man o’ the World gives that format to the type.
The face is turned to one side with the lips slightly parted, relaxed and attentive, the face of someone who has heard it all before. The body is armored and edged, and the face is at ease inside it. Worldliness here is composure worn over a defense.
“Worldly” also means secular, as against sacred. The arch behind the head is the form that frames saints and enthroned rulers. It frames a man of the world instead, a sacred setting given to a secular sitter. The title’s two senses of “world”, the places he has been and the ordinary human order he belongs to, are both in the bust.
