Stainless Steel
Meme is finished.
05/07/08 10:25 Filed in: Sculpture
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.
Candleholder.
18/04/08 08:31 Filed in: Sculpture
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.
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.
Meme.
16/03/08 17:33 Filed in: Sculpture
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.
Pas de Deux (Hello, Captain Cliche)
02/03/08 17:48 Filed in: Sculpture
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.
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.
Mmmmm. Leftovers.
08/11/07 13:06 Filed in: Sculpture
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.
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.
Blog? What blog?
07/02/07 15:33 Filed in: Sculpture
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.
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.
Beauty: Ned Kahn
18/12/06 08:17 Filed in: Inspiration
| Sculpture
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.