The vagaries and beauty of metal

 

Using salvaged metal comes with is rewards and sometimes unwanted surprises. More on the unwanted surprise later. Image of the furnace at 925 degrees follows.

Some more images of hearts and stars from two different metal melts. One produced stars and hearts with rainbow fire colour as you can see from the opening image and those below. The melt was mainly pewter but with a touch of vintage silver plated copper.

The more silvery melt was pewter with a touch of what was supposed to be sterling silver.

Now about that unwanted surprise. I did a melt at 925 degrees of metal from a vintage silver hand held mirror that was supposedly sterling silver. The metal melted and poured into the sheet metal form as you can see below; but when I came to cut the metal so I could roll it thinner the sheet simply shattered. So there was obviously something suspect about the original claim about the metal - who knows what impurities were in it.

I will remelt the shattered bits and add some pewter and i will pour more giveaway hearts and stars.

The metal used in the bowls and leaf words below was more predictable - a salvaged silver-plated placemat and several small silver-plated trays. The bowls ended up so shiny that they reflected the ceiling of the workshop!!! The leaf words are part of a commission.

The ongoing lesson for me regarding salvaged metal is that it offered mainly beauty but occasionally unwanted surprises!!! 

Solution from a friend

 

I have been mulling over how I might present-publish my small Scotland photo inspired poems - and then out of the blue Fiona received the gift of a small booklet from her friend Annwyn - I was immediately attracted to the clever layered design.

The possible presentation of a photo and poem might look something like the  opening photo - booklet size A7. Annwyn gave me permission to base my booklet on her design - much appreciated.

As you can see from the photos below I had sketched and worked out the measurements for my booklet during one of my biblio sessions.

Then I did the cutting, printing, typing on the old typewriter and stitching - with Fiona's guidance regarding needle, sequence and thread size. Photos of the process below.

The closure I settled on was my design - a wee toggle made from silver-plate; and at Fiona's suggestion a typed end page.

The mock up has given me the chance to do a practical test of the design - there will be a few refinements.

It is likely that I will not get to publish any of the poems until later in the year - too many things to do before we head to Scotland.

Almost autumn but beauty still in abundance

 

I'm amazed just by how many fragments of beauty have popped up on my walks. I particularly enjoy seeing the early morning sunlight settling on blossoms as can be seen in the opening image.

A cornucopia of shapes and colours follow.

A simple autumnal leaf and fallen blossoms on a car bonnet in the sunshine is like an art still life. Can you see the tiny beetle on the fallen flower bud on the leaf??? Many times I don't see the insects until I take a macro photo.

Even if we only see one fragment of beauty in a day, even if it is a common dandelion, may it lift us and give us hope.

Still standing strong in the landscape

 

In 2017 my sculpture Buttress Root was installed on the banks of Little Yabba Creek. The sculpture was selected to provide a canvass for poems about the landscape including the few remaining large trees with buttress roots. The piece is 2m high and 4m long and made from 10mm thick aluminium. The poems were CNC routed into the flat sheets before they were rolled into the trunk and sinuous root forms. The concrete foundations ate buried 1.5m into the ground!!! 

On Friday Fiona and her dad had to return home to Maleny from Noosa via Kenilworth because of the closure of the highway when a bridge was damaged. The trip home meant Fiona would cross Little Yabba Creek so I asked if she would stop and take a few photos of the sculpture as I wanted to see how it was holding up. Because the sculpture is installed on the flat near the creek it can be subjected to flooding as well as dealing with folk climbing on it etc.

As you can see from Fiona's photos Buttress Root is standing strong and still shining on after 9 years in the open.

Following are a series of images of the work from a few different angles 

Some of the signage informing the public about the sculpture.

We think a bird has found an alternate use for the brochure holder.

Looking towards the Mary River; and the canopy of trees. Little Yabba Creek feeds into the Mary River.

Behind the scene - making Daily Leaf Words sets.

 

Some folk ask how long it takes me to make different metal items. I mostly;y wander that I don't know because I don't time it. But what I do know that to make sets of Daily Leaf Words, as pictured in the images above and below, involves many steps over 4-5 sessions in the  workshop.

Some images of some steps involved follow. From the top down - from finished leaves at the top and the starting point of cut rectangular metal blanks: 

leaf forms ground and polished on the wheel; bowls hammered into shape with nylon and wooden hammers; disks of silver-plated metal annealed before hammering; leaf forms given a twist; tools used to open leaf forms in three stages; stash of folded leaf forms cut on the guillotine; leaf form being cut on the guillotine - watch your fingers; rectangular leaf blanks cut, stamped and folded.

The Daily Leaf Word sets shown in this blog are heading into my revamped online shop at as part of my Mindful Metal shop category.