“Water” is out of the oven and now has a nice blue finish.

Tags: Commission, Process, Public Art

I’ve made some candle holders that mount on the wall (uhh - you hang ‘em on a nail). They are made of 14 gauge stainless steel with a sanded matte finish. You can put one or two tea lights on the little shelf that is sandwiched between the plates.

Here’s a diagram that shows how they are constructed:


And a truly professional night shot, with a lit candle:

Tags: Process

Notice that new link up there (on the right)? Yep, I’ve opened an ecommerce storefront where some of my smaller works can be purchased. Go check it out!

Tags: Store

TD manufacturing in Greeley, Colorado prepping the “Water” piece for powder coating. Lloyd from Master Metal Works and I ran out to look it over and correct any flaws (I point out, Lloyd corrects). The metal looks really good. I’m excited that this project is finally starting to coalesce.

Tags: Commission, Process, Public Art

Tags: Process, Stainless Steel

Jafe Parsons got some preliminary shots to me this weekend of the finished "Meme" sculpture. Really, really pleased with this one. I think it is my best work to date - if that statement actually means anything. I oftentimes feel that my latest effort is my best; it takes a bit of time and perspective to get a true sense of how a single work fits into an oeuvre. Yet this does feel like a less tentative, bolder statement of form that is derived intrinsically and exclusively from my current process - the computer as primary tool for sculptural expression.

Tags: Stainless Steel, Process

Assembling the "Meme" piece.

Tags: Stainless Steel, Process

Back from Little Rock, Arkansas having installed my sixth major piece of public art. None of these installations comes off without a hitch, but it seemed like this one was actually easier than some of the others - perhaps indicating that John* and I are actually learning? Personally, I was able to relax a bit more, which in turn allowed me to communicate better with our crane operator and everyone helping us. The elderly crane owner was there (in addition to the operator) and his expertise made a huge impact - but he was very soft-spoken and had the thickest Arkansas accent I'd yet encountered. It took a conscious effort on my part to pause and really talk things over with him in order to comprehend what he was advising. I think I've finally gotten mature enough to shut off the ego and do what's needed to achieve the goal. About time. Also, the Little Rock Parks and Rec guys were there to help us out, and they REALLY did. The strongest lesson I came away with was that we collectively are much more capable and wise than any of us is singularly.

* - John Kinkade, the Executive Director of the National Sculptors' Guild and my dear friend of 16 years. (That's him on the far right above.)

More pictures here.

Tags: Process, Commission, Public Art, Quality

I've been working on some ideas for more utilitarian designs - if you can call a candleholder useful. The first image is the sheet metal shapes as modeled in FormZ.

And here is the first prototype in 14 gauge stainless.

This is (kinda) what it looks like with a tea light candle inside. I made a little platform that sits inside that will hopefully make the thing a little safer - the top of the enclosure does get pretty hot, but one of the unique properties of stainless steel is it's low thermal conductivity compared to other metals. The top gets hot but the sides stay cool.

The whole point of this piece is the pattern generated by the flickering light traveling through the holes, but my low-light camera skills is be real goodz - I could show you the pretty black rectangle I made, but... yeah.

Tags: Process, Stainless Steel

This picture, of Antony Gormley's "Waste Man" burning - filling the air with the noxious smoke of tons of discarded wood - set me thinking. Uh oh.

I understand that part of the point of this piece was to call attention to the massive amounts of waste we in the developed world produce, and to highlight the ephemeral essence of all the "stuff" we strive so hard to acquire. Gormley is one of my favorite sculptors - but this kind of condescending spectacle has definitely lowered his esteem in my eyes. Why exacerbate the very problems you are hoping to solve?

This brings up a point that bugs me no end regarding my own choice of method and material: how to reconcile the obvious environmental crisis-in-progress and my part in it with my (and our culture's) need to create and express. Is Gormley's monstrous cloud of smoke any worse in the end than the unseen multiple such clouds emanating from the iron mine, the steel mill, the tractor-trailer delivering the raw material for MY sculptures? Finding a point of equilibrium that allows one to be in the world without accelerating it's destruction is probably the most profound and important question we all must ask ourselves as we venture into a new millennium.

What do you think?

Tags: Process, Quality

This idea - or at least the seed of it - has been floating around inside my mind's eye for quite a while. I finally have the tools to make it a reality, which I find pretty damn exciting. It is meant as a symbolic treatment of Richard Dawkins' "meme" concept:

"A meme (pronounced /miːm/) consists of any unit of cultural information, such as a practice or idea, that gets transmitted verbally or by repeated action from one mind to another. Examples include thoughts, ideas, theories, practices, habits, songs, dances and moods and terms such as race, culture, and ethnicity. Memes propagate themselves and can move through a "culture" in a manner similar to the behavior of a virus. As a unit of cultural evolution, a meme in some ways resembles a gene." (From the Wikipedia article.)

It's that "propagate" bit that this piece plays on in the form of a concentric ripple - an idea moving from mind to mind like a wave, spreading out from it's origin and altering the energy state of other ideas within the culture. It also employs the imagery of a matrix or lattice to illustrate the memeplex being made up of individual, discrete consciousnesses experiencing a collective and individual transformation through the propagation. I think of this process when I analyze the slow but steady progress our species is making from one cultural paradigm to the next, as ideas like liberty, responsibility, and reason spread virally and replace those of dominance, exploitation, and superstition. As more minds begin to cohere, constructive interference amplifies these waves - and everything gets just a little bit better.

Tags: Creativity, Stainless Steel

I've finally had some time to break away from the Water & Power project. What do I do with the time? Design more sculptures, of course. OCD, anyone? I need to update my How? section to reflect the new tools I've been using - I've moved away from SketchUp and into fromZ for modeling. FormZ is a much more powerful tool, but it's burdened with a commensurate bump in complexity. I still spend more time wondering what the hell is going on rather than feeling confident in the necessary procedure to do what I need. This confusion has actually been a subtle prod to more creativity - playing without understanding can bring you back to the "Beginner's Mind" that breeds newness and breaks habits.



I just couldn't shake the impression of one form aiding the other to float overhead - like two ballet dancers in a pas de deux. This was rendered in Maxwell - I'm a rank amateur, so am excited about the potential quality renders looming on the horizon.

Tags: Process, Stainless Steel

Good thing it's a leap year. I'm amazed, as I normally feel like Feb is the longest, nastiest, darkest, most miserable month of the year - and it went by so fast, I barely noticed it.

Anyway, managed to ship the "Together" piece off to Little Rock.

Tags: Commission, Process, Public Art

Making good progress now. The base portion has an extra layer of steel sheet attached to it - to set off the main sculptural form visually, and to allow for easy replacement in the event of damage. I drilled all the holes in the 3d model so their locations will be built right in to the cut sheet metal, plus it makes for easier documentation for the fabricators. (You can't really make out the holes in this image, but there are 20 holes in the face we're looking at here. Each penetrates through the outer gray layer, the yellow layer, and into the structural steel.)

Tags: Process, Public Art, Commission

I'm finally getting the virtual model of the Water & Power project squared away. Pictured above are the structural steel components that will hopefully hold the sculpture upright in the Colorado wind.

Tags: Commission, Process, Public Art

Making art is a very personal process that oftentimes borders on mental masturbation. Maybe that's why I like it so much >grin<.

Creativity can be seen as a dialog you are having with yourself, with the dialectic centering around finding balance between your own skills and the qualia of the medium your dealing with. For me, there is a fine line between craftsmanship and fussiness - perfection is an idea, not a reality. If your work is exclusively about dotting i.'s and crossing t.'s, expressing nothing more than "look how good I am", then it's appeal to an audience that is not you becomes pretty limited. Striding the razor's edge between craft and expression can be seen as the fundamental struggle of artistic endeavor. I have learned to trust my eyes and my hands to produce that which I see in my mind's eye - but I've also payed a price physically while developing that trust. Both wrists and my right shoulder are permanently damaged from pushing just a little harder to get that piece done. Growing older and becoming more involved in large Public art projects have forced me to outsource the fabrication of the bigger sculptures, with a commensurate loss of control. I'm still learning how to make this new process work.

The above pictured piece, "Together", was fabricated by Master Metal Works here in Fort Collins. They've done a good job - but not as good as I would have done. That's the crux of the issue: surrendering just enough control to get the work done without sacrificing the overall quality of the sculpture.

Tags: Process, Public Art, Quality

I finally had the motivation to get professional photos of some of my recent small pieces. Happily, I happen to know a guy who is both a brilliant photographer and interested in my work - enough to want to work a trade. As I was importing the fruits of his labors into my computer, I realized that each and every image was beautiful. Thanks, Jafe.

Take a look:

There are more in the "Small" section.

Tags: Process, Quality

I did a small commission for a woman who was heading up her own real estate group - "Blue Moon". It was a fun experience, as I haven't done any smaller works like this, where client interaction is taking place just like on the bigger projects. We played around with different designs until finding something we both liked. This is what we arrived at.

Click on the image to see more of the chronology of the design.

What does this have to do with leftovers? The Blue Moon piece included a crescent of silicon bronze, which my laser guys don't keep in stock - I had to buy a full 2 ft. by 10 ft. piece. Needless to say, I had a lot of leftover material. (A-Ha!) I've always really loved the volumes and shapes of horses, so I thought I'd just quickly model something up - a horse head - to use up that bronze sheet. It was mostly just a lark, I didn't really intend to come up with anything too special - but I'm really pleased with how it turned out.

There is an area of discoloration that occurs adjacent to each weld, called the Heat Affected Zone (HAZ), that can include gorgeous reds, blues, and purples - I've always loved that stuff. On this piece, I decided to just let it be, to not cave in and grind the welds back or do anything else to obscure them. Bronze is 95% copper, which is highly reactive to environmental acids and chemicals, so you have to seal it somehow in order to keep it from changing colors. Clear powder coat to the rescue.

Tags: Bronze, Stainless Steel, Process, Creativity

Just received word that the Loveland Visual Arts Commission chose me for the Water & Power project. So very, very psyched. We are scheduled to meet on Monday to discuss a few design changes. Speaking of which, here are some pics of the models:


There are more over on my Flickr account, including renderings of the site.

Tags: Public Art, Commission, Proposal

Been working on maquettes for a project I'm a finalist for. It's been in the upper 90s - perfect weather for bundling up in thick leather and melting metal. Time to separate the men from the... other... men... who are smart enough to come in from the heat.

Tags: Process, Proposal, Public Art

After struggling for days - literally - trying to get a computer site model ready for a proposal, I finally figured out what needed to happen. It sucks when the best course of action is either to half-ass the job or spend money on YET ANOTHER piece of software. So far my experience has been that it's much more difficult to do professional work with hobbyists tools (so, yeah, I bought the damn software). Now I'm gearing up for my first exposure to Rapid Prototyping. I think I'm just about ready to send files out for quotes. I rewarded myself with a bike ride and some goofing off with my camera.

This sculpture has been at this stage for a few months now. The guys at the laser cutting shop must have a had a tough time getting the cut parts out of the stock, as the metal shows quite a few dings and gouges from their efforts. I should have rejected the parts, but they were stacked together so I couldn't really inspect them properly. It turns out that my unfolding on this was erroneous, and the fabrication was a huge pain in the ass - you wouldn't think it would be big deal, but each of the faces you see is actually supposed to have a diagonal bend across each one. Just 1/64 of an inch out of planarity, and the design almost didn't work. Lots of clamping, prying and cursing to get the edges to line up even near appropriately. I need to decide if I want to cover up those dings and gouges by grinding them out and powder coating it an opaque color, or if I want the process to be transparent to the viewer by just using a clear coat. Hmmmmmm.



More pics here.

Tags: Creativity, Process

Haven't had the time or the motivation to blog of late. BooHoo. The semi-latest news is that we were able to repair the damage on the marble ball and get the whole project wrapped up in time for some punk-ass kids to use the walls for ramps for their bikes. Damaged them pretty badly. Once again, though, the City of Paramount stepped up and repaired them - doing a fantastic job in the process.

Tags: Memorial, Commission, Public Art

Well, made it home from an installation gone awry in Paramount, California. We arrived on site early on Tuesday morning to find the "Upholding" sculpture broken. Our truck driver had done everything he could to try to minimize the damage after he spotted it happening, but things still got pretty messed up. I probably shouldn't get into details at this point due to legal and insurance issues, but suffice it to say that mistakes were made. Everyone at the City of Paramount involved in this project was on the ball and very professional in helping us get through this, and I'd like to say a big "Thank you" to them now. They managed to rent a TiG welder and I was able to reposition and re-weld the plates back into place. The marble ball was bruised and chipped, but should be repairable (we are already scheduled to fly back out in March to finish things up). In addition, a couple of the concrete wall sections shifted on the trailer, resulting in a big chip right near one of the plaques. The pre-cast company did send along a patch kit, so we were able to get most of the damage repaired - but more attention is needed. John and I put in a long, hard, frustrating 12 hour day, but we were able to get all 7 wall pieces and the sculpture itself placed. Not too bad, I guess. (Click on the image below for more pics.)

Tags: Memorial, Public Art, Commission, Doh!

I did this piece for a private party in uhh... 1989, I think. So I was 23 years old. The title of the piece is "Tropism" - it reminded me of a seedling just orienting itself to the sun after breaking out of the seed. The material is gray alabaster. I remember picking up the raw stone - it weighed about 1200 pounds, and the finished carving was 750. There was a lot of unsound material in the blank, and that influenced the design. Like most of my carved stuff, I had no predetermined concept in mind at the start, I just started wailing away with the chisel, letting the design evolve as I worked. I kind of miss that approach, but my wrists still bitch about the abuse they suffered to this day.

Tags: Stone

Oh, shit. I suck at sticking to stuff. Except making sculptures. For some reason, I just keep doing it. This year marks my 20th year of it, in fact. I made my first casting (that word almost makes me barf - it's like a shot of cheap tequila) in 1987, and went to work for Dan "The Man" Ostermiller in 1988. I've dicked around with tons of different modes of expression, but the one constant has always been sculptural form. I think I might dig out some old photos and scan them, do a sort of egomaniac's retrospective right here. Stay tuned.

Oh, and the attached pic is a fabrication shot of the "Upholding" piece for Paramount, CA. Scheduled to be installed on the 20th of this month.

Tags: Commission, Process, Stainless Steel

It's a rare and wonderful experience for me to find an artist's work that is utterly new to me and utterly spectacular. Ned Kahn's work makes me wonder why I bother - it's just that damn good. Mmmm, humble pie. My favorite.

Tags: Stainless Steel

Working on some graphics illustrating the placement of my Cubetower sculptures into street medians for the City of Long Beach, California. I used generic streetscape buildings from Google's 3d Warehouse to populate a mocked-up city. Sketch-Up also lets me set the location up as Long Beach in order to accurately study shadows and sunlighting for that particular locale. I used a more unrefined line style to suggest a first-draft concept that hopefully won't influence the client too much in regard to the actual execution of the design.

Tags: Public Art, Proposal

After having mucked around for two months, testing different ideas and undergoing about 300 revisions, I settled on this design to present to a client for a wall sculpture.

They love it.

Tags: Public Art, Proposal