Helmet Head/Chicken Colonel

Helen Wills Post

This is one of a series of "Helmet Heads" done in 1972. This work, "Chicken Colonel" was cast in bronze in an edition of 6. This is the fired clay maquette from which the edition was cast. The artist then glazed the ceramic with a bronze glaze. There is a picture of the cast work on page 14 of "Helen and Alan Post: A Painting and Sculpture Retrospective 1938-2002", ISBN: 0-9652720-7-9, 2002.

"Helmet Head, Chicken Colonel" depicts a somewhat exhausted colonel with an early aviator's leather helmet and goggles. At his neckline he wears 2 "insignias", 2 eagles (chickens) flying toward each other. A "Chicken Colonel" is a member of the US armed forces having the rank of full colonel, as distinct from a lieutenant colonel. The insignia of rank bears a depiction of an eagle.

Helen Wills Post, a niece of actor, singer "Chill" Wills, was born in Greenville, Texas on December 6, 1915. While studing at Princeton University, Helen met artist Alan Post whom she married. In 1946 the couple settled in Sacramento where her husband became the state's budget analyst. Largely self-taught, she was primarily a sculptor in bronze.