Friday, May 24, 2013

Anvil into action

During the demonstration of foldforming leaves at the Tatebayashi Citenzen's Festival tomorrow I will be using my small anvil resurrected from a rusted and pitted scrap piece of small guage railway line.

The anvil is pictured below. I have polished various edges and surfaces so that can be used in sequence to create a leaf form without changing tools all that frequently.

©2013 Barry Smith - Railway line portable multifunctional anvil 
©2013 Barry Smith - Railway line portable multifunctional anvil 
The edge in action below can be used to do the initial fold.

©2013 Barry Smith - Folding-unfloding edge in action for folding
The top surface is used for forming the leaf.

©2013 Barry Smith - Top surface for forming
The polished side edge is used again to unfold the leaf form.

©2013 Barry Smith - Folding-unfloding edge in action for un-folding
The polished rounded edge is used to spread and set the leaf shape.

©2013 Barry Smith - Leaf spreading-setting edge
And there is the simple small (about 70mm) formed leaf in the rough - needs a polish itself.

©2013 Barry Smith - Leaf form in the rough
I'm pretty pleased with this multifunctional tool. But the proof will be tomorrow - will it work to form 30 or more leaf forms over a 6 hour period??

7 comments:

  1. It's a precious tool, I hope it endures the stress.

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  2. that was fun to see
    how genius of you to figure how to use that creative anvil!

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  3. Great idea, did you have it as carryon luggage? Isnt Japan great.

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  4. i am really enjoying watching your process Barry. Love the railway anvil conversion.

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  5. Aahhh, so that's how you do it. I enjoyed watching over your shoulder, so to speak.

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  6. I agree with Robyn- so engaging to peer over your shoulder and see how you make your leaf forms.

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  7. EM, TL, P, SB, R & LAM - certainly a fun bit of recycling and as you can see from my follow up post (http://www.rustnstuff.blogspot.com.au/2013/05/treasures-from-tatebayashi.html) it worked. EM - it does have a sense about it - a Japanese environmental artist was really intrigued by it and said I had put a bit of myself into the repurposing of the old bit of metal. TL - not sure about the genius bit but these ideas do get suggested to me by the objects. P - I was going to do carry on but in this day and age it was not going to happen - and I agree there are so many beautiful things to experience in Japan - I need to have time to see more. SB, R & LAM - it is good that demonstrating the versatility of this recycled bit of rusty metal also showed the beautiful simplicity of the process when done with soft metals - bit trickier when working with silver-plated EPNS. During the Tatebayashi Citizens' Festival I estimate that about 15 women created their own leaves with a bit of demonstration and guidance - amazing given none had handled a forming hammer before. I think the various edges of this anvil just made the process a bit easier. Go well. B

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Comments are welcomed - it is good to connect with fellow travellers.