Art Blog » Category: sculpture
Spider Day Four
Last night I added only a gross (144) squares. That’s because I ran out! I have to buy more steel and make more squares. Also, I did a lot of detail work, becuase after I finished the abdomen I had to patch up some empty spaces on the back and near the spinarrets, and then I had to start the transition to the cephalothorax (front part), which was tedious. I put a lot of extra welds in this area because this small transition ara will have to hold the entire weight of the abdomen.
Spider Day Three
Last night I added another 212 squares to the spider abdomen. This makes for a total of 551 squares. The abdomen is almost complete. Now I will begin creating the cephalothorax…
Spider Day Two
Last night I added another 170 squares to the spider abdomen. This makes for a total of 339 squares.
Spider begins
I started a new metal sculpture that I’m building entirely out of squares (well, most are actually just rectangles and a few are triangles). You can’t tell right now, but it’s going to be a spider. The part I’ve built first is the top part of the back part … I have to learn some spider anatomy.
elephant day 4
Last night I spent a good 3 solid hours working on this little guy, but there’s less visible progress. I worked on some details, like adding metal to the body so that they ribs don’t show through as much. I also covered more of the head and started strategizing about the trunk.
elephant has a head
I got all hunkered down with the elephant last night. Didn’t even take the dog out of hiding (though she did get to pose for a picture with the elephant). I added lots to the elephant’s body, which is now almost completely covered. I also created a complte frame for the head with little pieces of bar, and then started covering it. Exciting! Here is the elephant from the front and here from the side.
elephant gets skin
How the elephant got its skin: Take a sheet of metal. Using the plasma cutter, hack it up into smallish pieces (1-4 square inches). Take once piece at time, weld it to the skeleton using the oxy-acetalyne welder. Heat, bang with hammer, weld some more.
I started this process on Wednesday night and got the elephant about 1/4 covered in skin. This process yields much better results on small creatures like this elephant and bull than it does on the dog, I think. Here are three pictures of the elephant, partly covered.
elephant begins
Last night I also started welding a new project (last week I started it by cutting and preparing the first 12 pieces of metal, but it was last night that I began attaching them). This will be a little elephant, standing only about 8 inches high. He doesn’t photograph very well right now, so you have to imagine you can see him in three dimensions. Here he is from the side and from the back.
dog continues
Spent a few hours tonight working on the dog laying an egg. Did a combination, for each piece of skin/armor I added, of forging, welding, and then heating with a rosebud and banging (in that order). I started adding to one front leg, but it’ll need some more work before it looks anything like right. Here she is viewed from above, with ears on show!
back to the dog
AFter months and months of neglect, the dog has finally gotten some attention. It’s been a while since I posted photos of her, so the differences are clear. She’s got a lot more armor/skin now. I posted a photo showing new metal next to old metal. Next week, there’ll be more photos from the front.