Workshop outcomes

 

Just before I came away I, with Fiona's much skilled assistance, did a 2.5-3 hour playing with metal workshop with a visiting family (mum, dad and teenage son). 

After having talking about options we might fit into 2-3hours they all said - "all of the above" which included: making a small bowl; making a copper leaf; and pouring and stamping a couple of metal forms (hearts and hulls). 

From the photo above and those below you can see we had a very motivated and quite skilled family group; and achieved some good outcomes.

The photos of the work bench rightly indicates that they all got exposed to a few different tools.

Fiona and I love it when we see the smiles of achievement on the faces at the end of these play workshops; and hopefully every now and then one person gets inspired to take it further.

Twenty boat forms for Scotland

 

I have been accepted to hold a solo exhibition in a small new exhibition space in the Scottish highlands towards the end of this year. One of the pieces will have 100 small boats. I have made the sails and hulls for 20 boats that I will take to Scotland this trip to see if it is possible to get a local welder to tack weld the sails to the mast and hulls.

The opening photo shows two prototype boats with the sails set in two different directions. Below are some photos of the process of making the 20 boat forms.

I will post some photos of the boats welded in Scotland if that works.

Another fragmented Friday

©2014 Barry Smith - Slivers trimmed from the metal book pages (about 1-2mm wide)

Today has had its fair share of art in it - but it has been a bit of this and that. Fiona and I dropped the 28 silver-plated pages off in Caloundra to have them etched for the book job we are doing; Fiona took the Peace display down out of the local library cabinets; I cleaned up my work bench - including harvesting the slivers of metal above which might go to Noela for her jewellery; and I got to make a few more fragment bowls.

The photos of the metal fragment transformation follows.

©2014 Barry Smith - Random metal offcuts - about 40mmX55mm.

©2014 Barry Smith - Pressed and hammered metal on the anvil

©2014 Barry Smith  - Polished fragment bowls - very shiny - hard to photograph without reflections

©2014 Barry Smith  - Polished fragment bowls - showing the backs of a few

©2014 Barry Smith - Bowls on the anvil - the after shot - picking up colours around the bench

Fiona is on dinner detail - it includes bubbles - so all is well.

Hammering for joy

Over the last little while I have been doing quite a bit of commission work; and much of this has included hammering metal. However there always seems to be a qualitative difference between doing creative work to order; and just doing it for it's own sake.

©2014 Barry Smith - Hammer marks inside one of the raised bowls - love the colours and texture

Today I got down into the studio-garage for more than half the day and hammered a couple of new Starburst Bowls; and finished off three raised bowls that I had started a couple of months ago. Such a good feeling to know I had not lost the touch or the joy of taking recycled metal to places I wanted them to go.

The Starburst bowls - third lot of hammering and back onto the annealing tray; and the finished bowls.

©2014 Starburst bowls having gone through a few hammering cycles

©2014 Barry Smith - Starburst bowls on the rust table

Different stages of the raised bowls - beyond open bowls but not pushed to pod form.

©2014 Barry Smith - Raise bowls on the annealing tray - after about 8 hammering cycles

©2014 Barry Smith - Showing how the hammering shrinks the metal

©2014 Barry Smith - Raised bowls ready for polishing - though I do like them raw

©2014 Barry Smith - Raised bowls polished - different recycled metals

©2014 Barry Smith - Silver and rust - great combo

We are now off to the opening of a calligraphic and paper craft exhibition - in support of fellow artists.

Around the bend and other matters

Its Friday right? Well that means as much art as can be squeezed in. The day started with a 2-hour meeting regarding some serious community-placemaking art for our preferred local store - but more on that when it can be revealed.

As part of a commission I need to be able to hammer metal over rounded corners of boxes. The form needs to be segmented and come to a point. I tried a couple of approaches which at best were okay; so I turned to Fiona for help. She suggested we went to folk who made balls or globes out of paper and see how they did it.

©2014 Barry Smith - Testing globe sections

Well as you can see from the photo above Fiona tracked down a free online globe pattern which we began to experiment with. After a number of tests and measures we have worked out that I can use a segment of the globe pattern to create the form I want on the corner.

©2014 Barry Smith - I think we have found the right section

©2014 Barry Smith - Yes that looks like it will work

Next step is to create the perfectly rounded wooden corner of the box and test the template out in metal.

But I needed a break from all that intellectually demanding stuff; so I decided to go to the studio-garage and start a stash of brooches.

©2014 Barry Smith - Bits and pieces cut and punched etc

©2014 Barry Smith - A bowl of brooches

Why am I doing brooches? Well it is because the folk in Maleny Additions have now asked me 5 times to do this - and they will not be denied. So I have made a stash and will take them in to see if it is what they want. I will share photos when I have had time to take photos of each of the finished brooches. Fiona has just said the curry is ready so I must away and enjoy it with a soft red.

A bit of a fishy Friday

©2014 Barry Smith - Small (250mm long) metal fish at sundown - looks like it is pretending to be a shark

Amidst other things I got to work on my fish installation commission today. I had started creating larger metal fish on Wednesday and Thursday afternoons - the biggest is 575mm long. Today the effort went into smaller metal fish - the smallest is 250mm long. Fiona asked what sort of fish they are - I said Barry-fish.

I make a series of components as seen below and then rivet the lot together.

©2014 Barry Smith - Looks like an Ikea fish

So the four small fish I made today are as follows.

©2014 Barry Smith - Four quirky metal fish

And a couple of shots of a small fish with a bit of body action.

©2014 Barry Smith - Fish with a twist

The bigger fish are made from the patterned section of a very large brass jardiniere.

©2014 Barry Smith - Big fish - just cruising

And the school of fish so far look like this.

©2014 Barry Smith - And the school of metal fish thus far

I am about to finish this very windy and cold day by making a couple of pizza (one is smoked salmon of course); and having a glass of red or two - just to warm up of course.

Metal reborn

When Fiona and I were in Melbourne for for we dropped into a store that made stuff from recycled objects. One of the terms they used on their packaging was reborn - I have seen the term before but felt that it is very apt for work where the recycled material is given new life.

On Friday I had started but not finished a number of things. Over the weekend I got time to do all the polishing and grinding. So a few photos of the pieces from Friday that are now finished - reborn

The Peace Leaves…

©2014 Barry Smith - 7 silver plated Peace Leaves

©2014 Barry Smith - Seek Peace - Imagine Peace

The Leaf Letter Openers….

©2014 Barry Smith - 5 silver plated Leaf Letter Openers

©2014 Barry Smith - Detail on the 'blades' of LLOs

The brass and copper leaves…..

©2014 Barry Smith - Polished stash of brass and copper leaves (30) 

©2014 Barry Smith - Curves and texture

The hammered flat metal…..

©2014 Barry Smith - Hammer and anvil marks

And the broken LLOs that has now become a small leaf and a long pendant.

©2014 Barry Smith - Broken but not wasted

Though the cutting and hammering gives the metal new life; it is the grinding and polishing that lets that new life shine.

Unfinished on Friday

As is often the case 'on the block' the day has been quite full. After our coffee in town earlier today I had a load (3 cubic m) of river stones delivered for spreading in the drain beside our driveway; which I'm widening and edging. It rained. I worked with a guy with a mini skid steer machine to spread the stone. About 1.5 hours later it was completely done. And the rain was useful as it washed the mud off the stones.

©2014 Barry Smith - Metal for Peace Leaves - stamped and ready for folding

Today's tasks in the garage-studio was to: make a stash of leaf letter openers and peace leaves as I was totally out of stock after selling 7 LLOs and 3 silver plated leaves during the week; finish opening some brass and copper leaves that have been on the bench for ages; and do a test run on some metal linked to a possible commission.

So the metal (stainless steel, aluminium, silver-plated copper and silver) were all hammered but not ground or polished.

©2014 Barry Smith - Metal test - hammering flat metal

The leaf letter openers and peace leaves were folded, cut, hammered and unfolded but not ground or polished.

©2014 Barry Smith - Five LLOs in the rough & one busted LLO

©2014 Barry Smith - Seven Peace Leaves on the bench

And the 30 copper and brass leaves were open-end but not ground or polished.

©2014 Barry Smith - 30 copper and brass leaf forms ready for the polisher

So you can see why I titled this blog post -  "Unfinished on Friday". But still quite a bit of progress; and satisfaction about being in the studio after being away in Melbourne all week for work-work.