DC35555

     When I started this Sculpture, it was in the waning days of February, when it was still cold outside, Now that it is the middle of April and 80 degree days are already a regular occurrence, it sure feels like it has been a lot longer than the 8 or so weeks it took me to complete this very ambitious project. But it turned out better than my wildest expectations and I am relieved I finally get a chance to share the work that I have been eating, sleeping, and breathing for so long.

     The drawing for this one turned out wonderful as well, although at over 3 feet tall and 6.5 feet wide when printed to scale, Its a little hard to view online. Most likely I will be printing them at 24"x 52" for now. But if anyone is interested in a full scale version, I might do a very limited full size printing run.

    As you can see, the entire sculpture is cantilevered, which gives it a marvelous tension, and at over 100 pounds I was a little concerned that my assumptions about the balance on this thing were correct. Luckily they were and it is quite stable even when moving it around, but the effect and gravity the piece gives off is just fantastic.

(more images and a video after the Jump)





                                        

February's work
This month, I thought I would try my hand at making a triangular or tetrahedron composition, this simple enough idea proved to be challenging in ways I had not expected. I must admit I didn't even consider this at first, but triangles are a very loaded shape. They are used in more symbols and icons than is possible to count, so when I started doing drawings for this piece I quickly realized how difficult it was going to be to make something that did not unintentionally allude to or reference some other easily recognizable symbol or design.




Once, I settled on a design, and began working, I ran into further trouble when I was doing some secondary operations and the work slipped out of the chuck and tore a chunk out of one of the points on the main body. Above you can see where I had machined off the damage on the top point, which was not part of the original design. I was not quite sure how to approach a repair or redesign, so, discouraged I decided to set the piece aside and work on other things while I thought over how to proceed.
To clear my head a bit, I decided to pick up on a shape I had made as a test part, and see where I could go with that, that led to this 6 piece hexaptych. These are quit small, the smallest being just 1" diameter and the largest approximately 2" tall by 3 1/2" across. 

The spherical shape that is incorporated into this series was one I used as a test program when setting up my new CNC lathe. It appealed to me as something more than a test shape so I wondered about how I could do a progression of works, that would be a sort of literal evolution of that shape, each more complex than the next. I followed it to what I thought was a logical conclusion and ended up with this six piece set. I designed all of these on the fly with no preplanning so it was a good distraction to clear my head from my problem piece still sitting on my desk.

But with that now finished, I returned to the task of fixing what I had started earlier in the month. I decided it was best to just bore out the damages area and start over.
I faced off the point and drilled a hole I could insert a piece of repair stock. then machined a matching plug
I press fit it into place using a little bit of metal epoxy to make sure it never moved again
and then I set about re machining it to shape.
Machining two of the three sides
once I had finished the repair a few other modifications occurred to me that really brought the work together, the time I had taken to think had payed off a bit it seems. I added the slotted aluminum rings you see beneath the blue green disks and made the base to help fill out the design a bit. Anyway, I think I pulled it out at the end but it was a challenging piece for sure.

First work of 2012. 1 of only 3 wall mounted works I have ever made. I had the idea for the center structure of this a while back, the rest of it didn't show up inside my head until a few weeks ago.
It is assembled with a similar structure as SH633. each section is joined by a turn buckle style fastener, here you can see it is a piece of aluminum square stock with a right hand and a left hand thread machined on each end. The Bronze wheel with the square hole drives it and I tightened it all down with this hastily fashioned spanner wrench.
a partially assembled shot for scale (sharpie for reference) Enjoy.

Well, the year is coming to a close and my shop is a mess, time for a good cleaning and then a break, but first things first. I just put the finishing touches on this beauty and I couldn't be more pleased with my final effort this year. I always try to be ambitious towards years end and this year was no exception.


This work went through more variations and re-workings than any that I can remember. It was on and off the drawing board for well over a year before I started any actual work.



 And when I settled on a final design, I realized I didn't even have the proper tooling to build it. I had been planning to build a new CNC lathe for some time, but this design was the motivation I needed to actually get that piece of equipment built. If anyone is interested in seeing that entire process during the build, there is a slide show here.


So to make a long story short, I took the entire month of October off from making Sculpture in order to build my new Lathe, just so I could begin work on this piece.


Well worth the effort and now I have greatly expanded my capabilities for future work.




In other news, I was chosen to receive a "B grant" from the Baker Memorial fund, which is a Baltimore based fund that recognizes achievement in the arts for local artists. It is alway's nice to be recognized in your own home town and it is very flattering to be chosen. See you next year.

Thought I would post my newest work. I made three of these little gems and they are directly related to some of the geometry I am using in my current large project (to be completed by the end of the year).


I shot a short video
Me and a friend were playing around with video documenting some of my processes and took some footage while turning the tops of this edition. And seeing as it was from this piece, I thought I would post a link to it in case some of you were interested in seeing it. . Its not the most exciting thing you will ever see, but it is gratifying to watch the chips peel off.  Process Video Link