Lockdown mark 4! We got cocky didn't we - thinking that we were on the gradual path to opening up. We thought we could run the Annual and Awards Exhibition with an opening and prizes and everything... and oh dear... well we can count our blessings - I think only one Victorian ended up in ICU and they are recovering now.
So to pick up the pieces of the exhibition - it's online - only the People's Choice Award is on offer - and we can run it again next October because our lovely hosts have found us a time slot.
I gave Contemplating the Finite another run... why not? It would have looked great at the Victorian Artists Society. That link won't work after the online show closes.... but if anyone wants to boost my People's Choice Vote... knock yourself out... In the meantime - stay safe - we aren't out of the woods yet.
Today I would have been helping set up the title labels for the exhibition at the Carlton Gardens.... but the whole Melbourne International Flower and Garden Show was cancelled a week ago and we have all been running around ever since trying to figure what to do....
Hopefully there will be an online exhibition. It will be hard putting that together since sculpture is a matter of real presence.
A Silver Nutmeg and a Golden Pear (2018)
It's been a bit tricky getting work done lately - car out of action in the airbag saga and not going to be replaced because my dear little Honda is 22 years old... but irreplaceable... I suppose I'll be managing with car share for a while - I'm just nervous of that too while the 'rona is about.
So wash hands everyone - we'll get an online exhibition going and put on a better show on the other side of this world changing crisis.
I owe so many people for their support in making this one... first Yvonne for putting the pressure on to make something for the ASV exhibition at the Flower Show. Then Mal Wood for taking my experimental work and coping with the inherent difficulty of an experiment and the deadline... and getting an amazing result...wow! And - there's more - Andrew Bryant found some timber lying around and turned it into the base for the work...... all that to produce an object from an idea - thank you everyone...
Stage one was the experiment: to see if bronze woven wire can be used to support a wax sculpture for a lost wax casting.
the wax - on bronze woven wire
That was tricky - the micro crystalline wax I used was too soft... so the work was floppy and had to be cut into multiple pieces - a total learning experience - but now I'm on the journey and can make more complex pieces... I hope.
the first view of the bronze casting after it has been reassembled
There was some holding of breath and then mad exultation when Mal and his team showed me the casting - it danced - it lives!
Then to find a base to present the work - much thanks to Andrew!
Burning is magic too
Thanks Andrew.... then assembly and patenation - alchemy!
And finally the pear.... it's been a while since I cast work in the kiln... now I can get a reading on how my power consumption goes:
Two molds went into the kiln on the Saturday afternoon.... I tried to pick the time when there wouldn't be a "curb your power" moment... just made it!
two castings and one to be used on this tree
And then... oh yes David helped me get the work out of the car and set up at the show.
image: Rob Anderson Photography
image: Rob Anderson Photography
and then... thanks everyone.... the work won a second prize in the Garden Section... and it sold! Am I a lucky one!
"Dancing Tree" in its new home - thank you everyone!
My neighbour Anna was walking in the park when the arborists were removing a tree
There was a significant crack so the tree had to go. We would have carved the three meter stump that was left but before that happened the tree was chipped - nothing left but a pile of wood chips.
Fortunately Anna rescued some rounds of the trunk and they duly arrived in my driveway.
The work I built was a response to the Build Bridges Not Walls campaign. Being my first serious effort with a chainsaw the work proceeded carefully and slowly - with many a call to gurus, chainsaw shops and sculptor friends.
I made a lot of shavings
I also made a sample piece - a tribute to the tree that never turned into sculpture and a gift for Anna.
Finally the work was ready and sent to the Melbourne International Flower and Garden Show
And then it came home again - to teach me how cypress will weather and to allow me to see what could be better.
"Secret Garden" at the Melbourne International Flower and Garden Show 2006
Flowers are ephemeral, fragile things - I built a sculpture called Secret Garden - I think it was 2006. And as I left the flower show where it was exhibited I slipped on some wet matting and broke one of the irises.
So the sculpture came home and moved house with me and more flowers broke over the course of the years.
So now that there are no more of the original irises it's time to cast some new ones and to experiment with techniques. I decided to try lost wax - foolish perhaps - but nothing ventured, nothing gained.
wax iris
So here is the wax with the copper "stem" threaded to attach it to the sculpture.
I experimented with a sort of shell casting for the investment - a mixture of patching plaster and silica for the registration layer, then building up in layers of refractory mixture and fibreglass then refractory mixture and grog until a mould was made. Then the hours of steaming - not long enough there was wax burning out in the kiln. I used some old glass - reservoir remainders from previous castings for this experiment.
Just out of the mould and still covered in plaster
I should have allowed longer at top temperature too - the glass flowed but didn't fill the petals - but amazingly against the odds it seems to have worked - a rough casting and tricky to clean.... but the spirit of the thing has survived. Time to build three flowers and get the sculpture back together.
.. and when it is finished then to start work on an exhibition of garden sculpture.... not to mention getting my own garden in fruitful and beautiful order.
