Burning

This monkey was whittled out of lime tree. I later burned it over a flame to give it a black, velvety surface. I´v had a hard time to decide weather to paint or not to paint my whittlings so this seemed like a good compromise. It was inspired by a part from Gustave Flaubert's 'Salammbo' where some drunken soldiers put trees on fire and try to cut off the trunks of elephants and eat their ivory:

"The trees behind them were still smoking; from their blackened branches the half-burned corpses of monkeys fell from time to time into the middle of the dishes. The drunken soldiers snored open-mouthed beside the dead bodies; and those who were not asleep hung their heads, dazzled by the light. The trampled earth was covered with pools of red. The elephants swung their bleeding trunks between the stakes of their pens."