"Iraq War Memorial Featuring The Death Of Prince Harry, The Martyr of Maysan Province"
Clay Manquette for Bronze Cast, Daniel Edwards, 2007.

Whate'er she meant by it, bury it with me,
For since I am
Love's martyr, it might breed idolatry,
If into other hands these relics came.
As 'twas humility
To afford to it all that a soul can do,
So 'tis some bravery,
That since you would have none of me, I bury some of you.
Donne. The Funeral

Its about the war in iraq, about celebrity culture, about the public, about shock aesthetics, though he is young and american and from brooklyn, it continues a tradition of conservative satirists that england produces so much better then anywhere else. it is more auberon waugh then it is john stewart.

but maybe it isn't satire at all. the Britney Spears sculpture he did, was a genuine, revelatory and erotic ode to the act of creation, and also perhaps how the act of creation can destroy. the pop goddess as kali. it seems prophetic now. the paris hilton sculpture was a monument to the crassness of fame unearned, and watches her downfall with schadenfeude.

& now he comes to the young prince. i think edwards takes old fashioned values like honour and family at face value. he thinks that soilders should fight in wars, and the leaders should be accountable for their actions. the generals who live in the bases should be in the trenches if there were trenches. the war came home, and harry drinks, is this a stiff upper lip or a callus disregard?

i think also of the historicism of the pose. how edward spenser at the funeral of harry's mother made her diana the godess of the hunt, the victim of the hunt, the parrellism of a high class education, and how this one (though made of bronze not stone) looks like the norman grave markers still at new westminster--and how also, she was a matyr to fame, and if he goes over, if he gets killed, then he will also be like that--and how well how that seems to be imporatant to engalnd, vital to see him live or see him die perhaps...