New stone . . .

Well, I see it's been nearly two months since my last post - no way to run a blog! Apologies are in order, but I've been busy learning new software for a related project and have not been in the studio(s) till about a week and a half ago. The weather has changed for the better so I decided to put the metal mountain project on hold and get myself outside. Above is a sequence of photos of the first six days of work on my last piece of alabaster - I'm planning a trip to the quarry soon to get more.
This is a fairly small piece - I'd guess it to be about 40 lbs. I was planning to do at least one rectangular or square piercing through the main body of the piece, but a serious impurity about 1/2cm. in diameter made the small piercing at the top necessary, uncomfortably close to some edges, but it worked out okay. Please note also that the beautiful veining in this piece of Italian alabaster is largely invisible until the dust is washed off, as shown in photos 5 and 6.

New wall-mount mountains piece

Here is a photo of an unfinished metal piece, and also a sketch of it's final configuration. Tomorrow I'll start adding the sloping 45˚angled top pieces, having painted it yesterday and roughed it up today. The sloping pieces at the top will be abraded aluminum sheet with exposed rivets. It is 40" wide. The tabs that will be used to attach the top pieces are visible.

A couple more photos of Silver Wall, Aluminum

I thought that the first photos I posted exaggerated the horizontal aspect of the piece so a detail shot and one in situ should give a better idea of its proportions.

Silver Wall, Aluminum is finished

This one is heavier and thicker than previous wall pieces because its core is made of hollow-core door panels glued together - about 2-3/4" thick overall. The piece is 41" long x 13" high x 8" deep. The skin is all aluminum, attached with zinc-plated steel screws.

Silver Wall-aluminum is nearly done

This wall piece is nearing completion. As the photo shows, most of the work on the top caps is done, leaving only the bottom
pieces to fabricate and install. Also shown above is a recent sketch of the next piece. It' s a difficult one to describe (and sketch)
because of its relatively shallow depth (it will hang on the wall), but showing some fairly strong perspectival distortion. This is a new conceptual scheme for me and I won't know if it has merit until I actually make it. This piece, I think, will be next instead of the stone I had planned. That will have to wait!

Silver Wall Aluminum - nearly finished

The newest wall piece is nearing completion - another 5-6 hours ought to do it. This one is heavier than the other wall pieces - about 15 lbs., I'm guessing. The door parts are capped with 1/2" plywood that will be capped with aluminum. The screws along the bottom edge are temporary and will be replaced by a line of evenly spaced screws that will hold the bottom cap in place. Same thing at the top.
When it's finished, I'm most likely going to carve a piece of stone. I've got one piece of Italian alabaster left in my stone studio and it is starting to talk to me.

Where have I been? What have I been doing?

I know, it's been a long time since my last post. I put off a lot of other things in weeks before our show at the Galesburg Civic Art Center. So, I've spent several weeks cleaning up the details - but working on sculpture too. I've got about 3 different projects going at present, and the photo above shows the one that will see the light of day first. The structure for this "wall" piece is a hollow-core, bi-fold door I bought for this purpose. I sawed one of the doors in half and glued it together to create about a 2-1/2" thick unit, which I subsequently sawed up and reassembled into what has become my defacto "wall" shape. It will be covered with aluminum, but not painted. I expect to finish it in about a week, so please check back then.