La Vie En Rose

Portland limestone plaque, 2005
h.21cm, w.122cm, d.5cm.

This is one of a series of Latin lyrics begun in 2002 in which Breeze has tried to demonstrate the continuity of sentiment over time and space. On one level these explore our assumptions about the culture inherent in Latin and the inscriptional form, and on another, they simply revel in the way words are refined through the process of translation into Latin. The original song lyric which also comments on this process says:

And when you speak angels sing from above
Everyday words seem to turn into love songs.

The translation by Colin Sydenham with its constraints of grammar and faithful adherence to the rhythm and rhyme of the original becomes:

When you speak, lo there is a holy song,
And an unpolished word becomes a song of love.