Ready for the next stone

 

After a couple of stones, my indoor carving studio achieves a truly amazing level of clutter - near total chaos. So, a couple of days ago I gave it a thorough cleaning to get ready for the next project. The orange air line above the bench leads to a large compressor in the garage and allows me to use my pneumatic
hammer for the roughing-out process. The airline under the bench leads from a small compressor out to my metal shop where it connects to a air/hydraulic riveter I use for metal sculpture.

"Navigator" - Finished, March 6th, 2013

 

Well, this one's a wrap! I thought that by using power tools I might be able to speed up my process a bit, and that might have been so if I had not gone a bit overboard with them. It actually did speed up the initial phases, but made for a slow sanding cycle, resulting in a break-even result on a stone of this size. It is actually a bit smaller than the two previous Mandala pieces, so a smaller base (green marble) seemed appropriate. I've decided to call this one "Navigator"

and more detailing . . .

I've entered the second most tedious part of this process; all the main forms are defined, but they need lots of refinement. Of course, the most tedious part is the sanding! I should be ready for that process in a week or so, maybe less if I can make it happen. On Thursday, I'm due to receive a shipment of a stone I've not worked with before - translucent orange alabaster from Utah. I'll try to post a photo of a chunk when I have it in my clutches. Above is a pic of the status of both sides of the current stone as of yesterday. Remember to click the photo to enlarge it.

And now . . . side "B"

I decided that it was time to give the other side some love, even though it seems to work just fine for me to get one side of these Mandala pieces nearly finished before addressing the other. As you can see, several stepped forms are coming out of the stone - a recurring theme it seems. I'd guess that this stone is approaching three quarters done, which means I'll have to start to thinking about what kind of base it will need. This piece is quite a bit less massive than the previous two, and will therefore need something other than a big chunk of concrete as a base.

New mounting aspect?

I'm considering changing the mounting to the position as shown in the photo. It seems a bit less static and solves the problem of the L-shaped form sticking down too far in the former mounting scheme. I'd have had to make it less deep and I like it the way it is. Side A is about 80% complete now and I've started to bevel the edges of forms that are finished (a good moment!)

More work on side A

As the photo shows, I spent today reducing the level of the central part of the stone. An idea I have about the possibilities of doing this is to create some real transluscency by reducing the other side

in the same area, or perhaps just part of it. Also, I did some work on the profile of the piece and plan to do more to soften the jagged appearance and reassert its circular nature. One of those projections may have to go in order to achieve that.

Continuing . . .

More refinement and detail are evident on side A of this piece as of today. Right now, both sides

are very similar, but that's due to change dramatically over the next few sessions. That will be accomplished mostly through changing the depth of various parts of each surface.