Accepted to the Sculpture in the Park and other shows

It's been a good week for shows. First, I'm quite thrilled to announce that I have been accepted to the 31st Annual Sculpture in the Park show held in Loveland, Colorado, August 8-10.

Accepted to Sculpture in the Park...

While I have loved exhibiting at the Loveland Sculpture Invitational these past 3 years - I'm very excited to be accepted into the Loveland Sculpture in the Park show this year....it's good to try new things and I wish both shows continued success. You can't go wrong either way - they are both the pinnacle of outdoor sculpture shows in the US!

http://www.sculptureinthepark.org/

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I'm also honored to announce that two of my sculptures are in the Women Artists of the West's upcoming show:

"Fierce & #9 Both Selected...

Both "Fierce and "Waiting on the #9" have been selected for “WAOWed in San Diego”, 44th Annual Women Artists of the West National Juried Exhibition at the Women’s Museum of California, San Diego, CA. The submissions were highly competitive once again this year.

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And lastly,

"Eleanor", "Fierce", "The Orator" selected for show....

Three of my portraits were accepted to the online Portrait juried contest WAOWed by the Portrait and can be viewed on the website.

Laying in some muscle mass - continuing the work on building the figure

 Sorry I skipped a step - I photographed the last of the skeleton but the photos didn't come out well enough to post. So here I have finished the simple skeleton and have progressed into laying in some of the major muscle masses.

As the finished sculpture is not an ecorche study, I am not concerned with making every muscle with attachments and origins. My goal is to lay in the shapes and forms of the muscles that most effect the surface.

I am using Chavant's Clayette in Hard for the skeleton and hands and Clayette Medium for the muscle mass. I will also use the hard for the face and hair as this is a small scale piece.

You'll notice that the hands look a bit big in the beginning. This is because there is little muscle - mostly bone and tendons in the hands and feet whereas the legs and arms have a lot of muscle and fat. When you strip the figure of a lot of the muscle and fat - the hands will look larger in proportion to the overall figure. As I flesh out the rest of the figure you'll see the hands and feet will look more normal with the larger forms of the legs, arms and body to balance things out.

My husband just walked by and wondered aloud if all this skeleton and muscle work was necessary and wouldn't it be easier and faster just to glob it on? Short answer - yes and no. Sometimes I do just jump straight to large masses (outer form of skin) and quickly set things up. But taking the long road (bones and muscles) does things for a piece of art that just can't be achieved any other way.

Sturdy armature for new sculpt

 Excitement and enthusiasm for sculpting is a wonderful thing. Impatience is not, however. I've had a few occasions where my excitement over starting a sculpt when I didn't have all my materials ready led to trials and tribulations later.

This time, I'm spending more time in the prep phase which is going to pay off in spades later when I get to real sculpting adventure.

On my last sculpt, "Loss" (working title) I didn't secure the armature 'feet' firmly to the base board, which meant that with jarring, came shifting. Any kind of movement of the armature can create problems and an armature that is weak or prone to movement can wreak havoc on the work.

I reigned in my enthusiasm for my new piece, "Joy" (working title) and set about to make the bones of this sculpt strong. I began by drawing out the template on the baseboard of where the clay base for the sculpt and placement of the feet will be, as this will be a companion piece to "Loss" which is currently at the foundry being poured as a bronze.

Next I used my drill to countersink a hole for the washer and nut that holds the vertical post onto the baseboard. Then I created arms using armature wire and wire sleeves and attached the arms at the shoulder. The arms are long at the moment and I will cut the excess off once I start laying in the anatomy. Measure twice and cut once - a wire that is too short is useless.

Finally, I marked where the bottom of the feet will be on the leg wires and then hammered nails over the remaining wire ends to secure them firmly to the board. No shifting! It's a bit awkward looking - you have to keep in mind that there is going to be clay on the base that covers this up and the feet are actually higher up on the leg wire. You can see that I started to wrap some fine gage wire around the armature wires. I don't always do this, but some clays need more to grip onto than just the smooth single armature wire. By wrapping wire I give the clay a lot of area to grab onto and hold tight.

This sculpt will measure about 15" tall by 15" long by 6" wide when complete.

Wax off to foundry for bronze

Murphy's Law strikes again. When I started "Loss" (working title) in waterbased clay over an armature I was planning on sculpting quickly and getting her to the moldmaker quickly before the clay dried. Then my publisher called with illustration work and deadline after deadline meant that the clay sat for long periods without work and parts dried and cracked before I could get her to the moldmaker.

Consequently, the mold isn't the best and required copious amount of sculpting in wax to repair. Naturally that is when my thermostat regulator that I use to dial down the heat (on my wood-burning tool that I use for wax chasing) died.

That meant that the tool now had two settings: Off and Vaporize. I do mean *POOF!* - touch that hot tip to wax and it disappears into a noxious cloud. So I spent many hours warming metal tools against the hot tool and then trying to sculpt the wax. Not the best system, but what I had available.

So - the chased wax has been delivered to the foundry and appointments set for the Metal Chaser and Patina Artist to follow - next up is taking he base template into the base shop to have the cut while I'm waiting for the bronze to be made.

Building up the form of the figure

I'm continuing to build up the forms in this water-based clay sculpture that is based off of my tiny maquette, "Loss". I cut off the arms and removed the wire armature as they were drying out too quickly - that then started to place the arm shapes back into place with toothpicks to bolster them until the clay firms up a bit. 

The clay is old and isn't the best to work with. Seems like I buy clay - then another deadline hits and I store it too long - and it loosed the placsticity a bit. Nevertheless, I will continue to refine the sculpture and add the hands next. On a different note, I've been accepted to the Loveland Sculpture Invitational again this year and will be working hard to have new works for the show in August!

Correcting facial proportions in clay

 I'm back in my studio now and working on "A Good Read". Still blocking in the basic musculature and forms. While working, I could see that the lips were too close to the nose, giving too much chin to the face. So I have shown how to fix this problem.

First I took my sharp metal shaper and cut upwards towards the nose to cut the lips off. Then I removed the lips. Next I replaced the lips onto the sculpt only slightly lower.

After the lips are in place, I rolled out a small coil of clay and placed it above the upper lip to fill in the crack. Then I continued sculpting and adding more forms to the clay.

You can see that everything is very rough and that I am not concentrating on any one area. As I work on the piece I'm constantly moving around the and working front, back, side and adding clay as I go to keep the piece moving along.

Beginning State of Grace final

     Starting the final clay for "State of Grace". This time I'm using Jmac Classic clay - medium for the body and firm for the head and hands. I did the maquette a while ago and now that I've finished a few things, it's time to start this one. I'm using the 1/4 scale (16") Truform armature for the first time. So far it's going pretty well. It's nice to have the hips and torso blocked in with the Truform, but I did find I had a few problems with the placement of the support bar. After working on it for a while, the weight of the clay pulled down on the lower part of the body and elongated it out of proportions.

Using my calipers, I was able to tell it was quite distorted, with the upper torso much too long. The weight have pulled down on the wire spine.

So I cut her up and removed her, shortened the spine wire in the torso and re-bolted her back into place. Hopefully I have it tight enough now that this won't repeat.

Because she's floating the weight is more of a factor - if she where standing and supporting her weight it wouldn't happen as much. But I won't be sculpting the fabric support until later. You can look back into earlier posts to see the maquette that I'm working from.

I'll be taking time on Friday and Monday to chase the waxes for my bronze Harriet Tubman and Waiting on the #9 - then back to working on this pose on Tuesday.

Finishing "Waiting on the #9"

Sorry for the poor photos - I was rushed and simply threw a spotlight on this and grabbed some shots before the sculpt went out to the mold-maker this morning. I had a bad sculpting day earlier this week and over-worked the piece. It went from nice and fresh to stilted and posed. Part of if was the softness of the clay for such a small sculpt and part of it was me rushing because time was running out to get this into bronze in time for the show.

I also noticed that as I overworked, I ended up pressing on her neck a bit, causing it to shorten and thicken. So I cut off her head and neck and sculpted a new one. This time, I added flowing hair to add to the breeze that was ruffling her dress. You'll notice that her hand and purse are a different color. I used Jmac Classic clay for the purse, as it is a harder clay for the tiny detail. Then, since the fingers were too soft to hold their own form with the Chavant, I added 1/2 Classic to the Chavant and mixed together. I could have used straight Classic, but was concerned that the difference in clay would impact the surface of the clay and not hold the marks the same way - to be safe, the mixing of the two clays gave a better transition from the arm to the hand. There is armature wire (22 gage braided) that is poked through her index finger to give enough strength for holding the purse and also in the blowing sections of hair.

This sculpt was a big learning process and I struggled a lot with it - which is good - from adversity comes improvement. I learned that every clay has its own strengths and weaknesses and it's very important to choose the right clay for the scale and style of subject. As I stated before, on a larger scale piece I think I would enjoy the soft, buttery feel of the Chavant Le Beau Touche a great deal - it would be easy on the hands and effortless to apply - it just wasn't the right clay for a full sized sculpt with a 1.5" face ;-) I also learned that it would be a good idea to bolt the armature wire of the feet to the board to stop any lateral motion or shifting, which causes cracks in the ankles and also can lead to minute twisting that you don't notice till later.

I enjoyed this sculpt - even the several times that I had to rip off and re-do sections and I liked the attitude and pose. This is one that I may come back to and enlarge to a bigger scale for bronze at some point. For now - it is off to the mold-maker who will chop her up and make the mold and pour the wax - until then - time to clean the studio and get the next piece started...

Refining the pose

 I've been a bit preoccupied with the High Park Fire near here. It's been very smokey and some of our friends were evacuated. The fire is over 50,000 acres but the firefighters have been amazing and we're at 15% containment - if we could get some rain and a break from the winds....

We've spent the past two years renovating a little log cabin by the Poudre river in the mountains. We only just got the new well, pump and bathroom installed, not to mention all the work re-chinking and a huge amount of overall repair. Hoping it survives this fire.

So - on to work. Have I mentioned I'm not in love with this clay? Chavant makes wonderful products and Le Beau Touche is one of them - however it takes the right clay for the right job and my opinion is that this clay is wonderful for larger scale works. At 1/5 scale its too soft and creamy but I can see how those attributes would be delightful at a larger scale and much easier on the hands. I'm sure that I'll enjoy using it again when I work larger. For now, just trying not to squoosh all the hard work.

I've been refining all the areas that I had to recreate after the shipping disaster. You can see that I have taken her hand off to sculpt separately. I added a bit of wax to the clay to resculpt the hand to make it a bit firmer. Still working out some issues on the dress wrinkles and need to get her other sandal sculpted again. Have fallen way behind. My original goal was to have this finished and in bronze for the Loveland Sculpture Invitational, however with the major setback of having the resculpt without the model, well, that's simply not going to happen. Moldmaking takes several weeks and bronze another 10-12 weeks. How disappointing.

Introducing the Proportional Caliper- my new BFF

 The proportional caliper is an amazing tool and I'm not quite sure why I didn't start using it earlier. Stupid stubbornness perhaps, but likely I felt like my eye was pretty good and I didn't want to mechanically tie myself down to tedious measurements. Most especially since I tend to work loosely from the model and create what I see in my own mind more than what I see before me.

However - I can thank John Sherrill Houser for recommending this tool for his class and Victor Issa for for catching some proportional mistakes that weren't obvious but were nonetheless there.

I got my calipers at Sculpture Depot and they reduce to 1/5 or enlarge up to 5 times. I got the metal ones because they would fit into my luggage for the plane trip to Brookgreen, but I like the look of the Polycarbonate ones and will likely get them soon.

In a nutshell - you set the calipers for the scale of enlargement or reduction you need - you measure your object with one end and the opposite end will have the proper change of size. For instance, "Waiting on the #9" is a 1/4 scale sculpture. I set the sliding bolt at the 4 mark which allows me to measure the length of the back of the model's hand and the flip the tool over and use the corresponding 1/4 scale size to check the size on the sculpture. In this case - it was from the bend of the wrist to the first knuckle of the middle finger.

I also measured from the ankle bone to the middle of the knee and the width of the ankle bone. Constantly checking in this manner is a wonderful way to keep things in check and to identify an area that may be out of proportion. I'm in love with this tool and it's my new BFF of my studio and use it for many measurements throughout the entire figure.

That said - the caliper is a mechanical device and won't dictate exactly what I do. There are times when  deviating from the model's measurements is an artistic and deliberate choice made to enhance the figure, make the pose more dynamic and interesting or to make an artistic statement....as long as these choices are made by the artist and are not a product of accident or laziness.

Re-sculpting the figure

 Well, I had my time to pout, eat chocolate and have a glass of wine. Then it was off to the hardware store for supplies and home to start re-sculpting the smashed figure.

First I had to fix the armature base and reassemble the rod. Next I cut the clay off her legs from the knee down where I found that the wire was badly bent and rounded. Then I took pliers and straightened out the legs.

Then I cut her head off at the clavicle. The entire neck region had smashed and reworked the armature there before putting her head back on and lengthening her neck back into proportion.

Overall the entire figure rolled around in the box, so everything was a bit compressed, so I spent some time getting her stretched back out a bit.

Finally, I put her back onto the armature stand and started to put the clay back on her and begin the process of resculpting the figure. I started with giving her new feet and legs, then pulling out her right arm and working it and finally, starting to give her a face again. I'll try and get a little more done today and tomorrow but then will be out of my office for the holiday.

I'm still very unhappy about the shipping accident, but it feels good to start making the repairs - I was very excited about this sculpt and am looking forward to continuing the work.

Shipping disaster - or how to destroy a sculpture...

 How utterly disappointing. I was looking forward to finishing "Waiting on the #9" this week following the National Sculpture Society's Celebration Weekend in Loveland. I had this sculpture professionally packed and shipped from a shipper near Brookgreen Gardens.

When I got the box, all looked great - from the outside. Not a dent and it indeed was carried to my door right side up. When I opened it, however, this is the what I found. The sculpt had come completely off the vertical armature post. The screw was stripped and the sculpture was lying face down, ripped off at the ankles.

Obviously it had rolled around hard because the armature wire from the ankles down was torqued and bent. The whole thing is badly smashed.

The sculpting base had been screwed to the plywood under the inside box (it was double boxed) so the base was secure. I can see that the sculpture stand base is compromised, the vertical support pipe is loose and the bolt tightening it will no longer hold it tight because the board where the pipe fits has been weakened, so the pipe will no longer be sturdy on this armature. You can see the stripped pipe treads and how it has metal burs coming off on my hands.

This is sickening and I can't deal with it today because I'm too disappointed, not to mention behind my projected schedule to finish and get to the foundry. Instead, I'll head to the hardware store to collect items for a new armature and assess if anything can be salvaged tomorrow when I'm not as angry over this $150 shipping nightmare....

Adding clothes to the female form in sculpture

 The pose was classical nude, but I wanted to sculpt something a bit more casual, contemporary and fresh. When I began sculpting this figure, the attitude of the stance gave me the impression of someone waiting - caught between patience and impatience - you know - when you've been waiting patiently but now are beginning to get just a bit antsy because there is really someplace you want to be....

This summer we took a trip to Switzerland and Italy and I was enthralled by the public transportation there. Buses and trains, in addition to walking and bikes are an everyday mode of getting around and people are so cavalier about getting where they want to go in this manner. As we don't have commuter trains and not a very convenient bus route/time in my town, this was fascinating to me. Especially because we love trains!

So this young woman is representative of that feeling - she's "Waiting on the #9".

The model brought in a beach dress, but I wanted something that looked more like a dress you'd wear in the city - so I created one that I liked and gave her casual flip flops. Next, I'll be adding a sweet and sassy little handbag casually draped from her fingers behind her back.

I never got into dressing up Barbies when I was a girl - I was more interested in making them climb trees, fly like superheros or ride horses - clothes or not! Therefore I'm a bit surprised about how giddy I am at 'designing' outfits and dressing my sculpt...something my 8th grade Home Ec. teacher would be amazed at considering what a total, dismal failure I was (am) with anything to do with sewing ;-) Well - clay is easier in my world so I think I'll stick with that.

Continuing the rough in of standing figure

This is a continuation of blocking in the standing figure on day 3. I'm using my ipad to take quick photos as I go so the quality of photo isn't very good, especially the lighting.
After I took these photos, I raised up her support bar on the armature stand so I could add some additional clay under her feet. I felt it was too thin, plus I had decided that I wanted to have her wearing flip flops and a dress and needed room to put her shoes. Also the slightly larger base will give the piece more support - both in bronze and also when I ship the soft clay across the country back home to continue working.

I find the darker red clays are a bit more difficult to see the form over the lighter tan clays. Not everyone will agree with me on that, but it's a personal preference.
I made many changes as I worked quickly and didn't have the opportunity to photo those changes. I cut her head off twice to raise and lengthen her neck. It was correct by the proportions of the model, but didn't feel quite right on my piece, for the attitude that I was going to convey. So those changes were quite satisfying to make. When sculpting for yourself, you're quite free to change proportions and faces and hair - something I do quite often. That's not the case for a true portrait, of course, where you need to represent the client accurately. However, as I'm deciding the course of this particular piece it's quite liberating to create her however pleases me. Tomorrow I will post photos of the piece as I've started to sculpt her clothes and  shoes - which I enjoyed tremendously.

Standing woman figure sculpture

I'm back from my trip to Brookgreen Gardens in South Carolina where I attended a sculpting workshop by John Sherrill Houser. If you have the chance to visit Brookgreen, the grounds and sculptures on display are lovely and I wished that I had more time to really take it all in. The lighting, however was very difficult to work under, a combination of small spot lights and skylights. When the clouds drifted in the lighting was reduced. We had a week-long pose with a wonderful model that we worked from and the last day, we had the model bring in some dresses. I have been wanting to work on clothing so was pleased that the class agreed to this approach.

 We had and armature and board and were sculpting using Chavant's Le Beau Touche. I've worked with Chavant clay before and it's quite good. Brookgreen had a warming box and when warm, it is easy to manipulate.

I would add, however, for the way that I work, I think that this clay is better suited to larger pieces. Since we were working with a 16" armature, the clay was a bit soft for my style of working. At a larger size, I would think it would be well manipulated by fingers and would work quite well. It did stick to tools quite a bit and I found that I had to keep baby wipes handy to to clean my tools down quite a lot.

The images shown here are at the end of day two and I have probably about 10 hours of work.

Brookgreen Gardens Sculpting Workshop

Lucky me! I'm packing up for a week-long sculpting workshop at Brookgreen Gardens with John Houser on Anatomy and Structure of the Figure. It will be intensive and exhausting and I'm really looking forward to all I can learn~

Ascension Traditional Bronze Patina

This is the traditional bronze patina on the same sculpture, Ascension. Interesting how the patina can change the look of a sculpture. They are both beautiful in different ways.

In other happy news, I'm happy to say that I was again selected to show my work at the Loveland Sculpture Invitational 2012 - so time to get back in the studio, finish those two waxes and get back to sculpting!

It's a matter of balance...

 I let this piece rest a bit as I finished up my latest book, "Bully Goat.". I'm glad that I did too. There was something about the piece that wasn't quite what I was looking for and needed the time and distance to mull it. I am trying to achieve the same sanguine feel of "Ascension" but there is a fine line between calm relaxation and stagnation of a pose. I came to the conclusion that the the pose was looking a bit too much like she was levitating instead of rising...there wasn't the balance of dynamic tension that I needed.

So I began to smush, cut, twist and turn until I got a pose that still is sanguine and relaxed, but now has some forward energy. The woman is leaning slightly forward as she ascends and the fabric that will be her support is going to trail backwards, giving a bit more movement.

I'm very glad that I decided to do this maquette (clay sketch) before going to final art, as it gave me the opportunity to practice and work out some problems, which will allow me the pleasure of pure sculpting on the final piece next week! I am going to take "State of Grace" down to my foundry and base shop tomorrow to have them verify that the balance of the sculpt will work in bronze and get some base ideas too. I'll also have the pleasure of picking up my first two finished bronze "Ascension" pieces!

Next, I'll be off to the hardware store to get a few odds and ends to finish up the armature before starting the final 18" version of "State of Grace".

Below is the newer pose with more dynamic tilt to her body and flow of fabric behind her:

Here is the original pose. While I liked how quite and relaxed and in repose she was, I was concerned that the overall feeling was more of stagnant levitation instead of active ascension. What do you think?

Hot Patina on Bronze Ascension

 Nearing the end of the bronze process. The final chased bronze sculpture was attached to a temporary base and washed wshed in a mixture of Potash Sulphurated (also known as Liver of Sulphur).
Then the whole thing was heated in an oven for 20 minutes. Next the patina artist, Chad, layered titanium while and other earth colors and blazed it with a torch.
Once the metal has cooled, it will be sealed with laquer and waxed an attached to the final base made of Nordic Green Granite.I should have photos of the final bronze sculpture soon!

Refining the clay sketch maquette "State of Grace"

 I spent a little time refining the forms and attitude for this clay sketch. It is next in the series that I'm doing of rising women. The first, "Ascension" is nearly finished in bronze and releasing very soon. This sketch in clay is a study for the next to go to bronze. The simple armature is 12" - about the same size as "Ascension". The final for this sculpt will be 18" using the smallest of the TruForm armatures.

Overall, I'm pleased with the direction that this is taking, but will change the hair and cloth a bit on the final. I'll be taking this sketch down to Art Castings to have them look her over for any casting problems before I start the final. I'll also take the sketch into the Base shop to get some ideas before I go to sculpt that may change the fabric and the overall height. Once I've had a chance to discuss this piece with my bronze team, I can begin working on the final clay to size.

This piece will be titled "State of Grace". 12" armature - but with hair and cloth she is currently 18" tall.