Here is the first try of an illuminated wall piece.  It is a model, but big enough to hold a tee light.  A bigger piece will have more safety room for a tee light, but ideally it will have a light bulb that is wired directly into the wall.

illuminated wall piece

still interesting with day light

The solstice!

It seems to be the right time to start playing with light in my sculptures.

Here is the first piece I made with light in mind.  As I am finding out it is great to illuminate it from above or below, but not from behind it as I originally had thought.  The light source will be seen and distract from the form.

This piece is made to hang on the wall and I loved playing with 2 mirror images as I have done hundreds of times with the symmetric shapes of earrings.

mirror images wall piece

side view, this piece is about 29" tall, about 72 cm

my first testpiece in hydrocal, "comfort"

Abstract 1

Abstract 2

Abstract 3

Passage

Turtles out of bronze, plaster and hydrocal

I finally took some pictures of these pieces.  If you know my palm sculptures, you will recognize these shapes.  Here are samples of how they could be mounted on stone.  Wouldn’t they look great in front of a library, office building or in a park?  Who would like to commission them?  I am game!

Auf deutsch:

Hier sind neue Fotos.  Die montierten Stücke sähen doch sehr gut vor einer Bücherei aus, einem Bürogebäude oder in einem Park.  Ich brauche nur einen Auftrag.  Ich bin bereit!

It has been a while since I actually worked on a sculpture.

I finished putting together a book about my sculpture show at Merryspring Nature Center in Camden ME.  This process now feels complete, although the sculptures will remain in the garden throughout the winter.

Coming back from Germany from a family trip I now had the mental energy for something new.

For a while I wanted to try out hydrocal as a material.  I had worked in plaster before and liked the process of building the form up and then filing it to give it definition and shape.  But I was looking for a harder material, that is not so sensitive and could even be outside.  Someone had mentioned hydrocal and I actually got a bag 6 month ago.  Now it was time to try it out.

I started out with copper tubing and fabric

I started with a form of copper tubing which I covered with fabric to get the initial shape.  Now I mixed the hydrocal and put  a layer of burlap soaked in hydrocal over the fabric.

I noticed that the hydrocal stays longer in a workable consistence than plaster.  I can mix it to be thicker in the beginning than plaster, so it doesn’t run down and it hardens slower.  All this works really great.

I ended up mixing fery small amounts and adding many layers.  The most timeconsuming part is cleaning out my mixing container.  So I ended up reusing old paper cups that I collect when I get a tea on the road.   The thickness of the piece grew much more than I had planned, but it needed the substance.  Following the lines was an interesting unfolding.  I didn’t really wanted to have an inside surface, an outside surface and a thick edge.  I followed the the movement of the lines and how they wanted to travel from the outside along the edge to the inside.  Now it is one infinite flow without break.

Once the surfaces seemed filled out I started to file the piece to make the lines crisp.  Now it is slowy drying covered in plastic.  Then it will get another going over with a file.  I would like to retain a texture.

The whole process sure dulls my files!  Only the edge is still usable.  I wish there was an artsupply place here!

continues flowing line from inside to outside

"Wintersleep"

Here is an entry showing my other line of work- jewelry:

Pendants for Men and Women

I always have been interested in creating jewelry that can be also worn by men.   Here is an attempt to create pendants that speak to the raw, unrefined, pure and adventurous spirit of both men and women.

Forging

Forging is the oldest form of metalsmithing.  In ancient times after the metal had been purified and molten it had to be forged into usable shapes like wire or sheets that then could get more refined into the creation the metalsmith would work on.  But the very first step was the forging.  These pendants are all made out of copper square or round stock and forged into different shapes just with a hammer on an anvil.  I use an old railroad track as my anvil.  No two pendants will be the same.  They might remind one of an old, favorite, well worn tool used in farming or boat building.

forged copper pendant

all pieces are about 40cm long- about 1.5'

this piece has a green patina

different cords can be chosen for each piece

rustic, simple yet elegant

like a favorite tool

this piece is 50cm/ 2' tall

3 different sizes, from 34-48cm. Showing different cords

Spiraling; just installed it at Merryspring

copper tubing

can hang either inside or outside. It is about 3.75 x 2 x 2'

view from underneath

Flowering with plants

it is nice to see the plants climb all the way to the top

This is the press coverage of the sculpture show “Art Nature and Design” at Merryspring Nature center.  http://www.villagesoup.com/AandE/story.cfm?storyid=168847&CFID=82069712&CFTOKEN=42669809

Spiraling is installed at Threefold Education Center in Spring Valley, NY copper tubing and translucent membrane

the segments actually correspond nicely with the shapes of the railing

the sculpture moves freely with air movement

we replaced the big light with smaller spot lights and hung the sculpture in the space instead. It brings dynamic into the very symmetrical space.

the morning of the show, last set up for welding "Harmony"

surprise, the sculpture didn't fit into the car....

1 hour before the opening I installed "Harmony"

sitting nicely in the herb garden