The stone carvers

©2015 Barry Smith - One of Judy's spirals

Over the last couple of weeks a number of artists have volunteered their time to continue to develop their peace and environment inspired stone monoliths for the Peace in the Trees installation.

A big thank you to the Sunshine Coast Council for providing funds to pay for sculptor Wayne Markwort to supervise the 4 days of volunteer sculptural work.

It was hard and dirty work but a lot of satisfaction when we saw where we got to given none of us are stone carvers. The stone is very hard Helidon sandstone with ironstone inclusions. We have deliberately left much of the raw stone for contrast; and also the drill holes Craig Medson used to hand split the stone.

Some of the carvers and their work follow:

©2015 Barry Smith - Kim with her piece Solace

©2015 Barry Smith - Detail from Solace

©2015 Barry Smith - Emma chipping away

©2015 Barry Smith - And the goanna emerges

©2015 Barry Smith - Michael added to his design

©2015 Barry Smith - Katie adding to almost every face of her large block of stone

©2015 Barry Smith -  Peace in many languages

©2015 Barry Smith - Rose quartz in the bowl on top of Katie's stone

©2015 Barry Smith - Our sculpting instructor Wayne Markwort put a bit of emphasis around  Carolyn's Heartfelt piece.

©2015 Barry Smith - James' piece was given some finishing touches

©2015 Barry Smith - Cathy and Wayne added to Cathy's Platypus

©2015 Barry Smith - Judy getting down and dirty

©2015 Barry Smith - Intricate spirals on Judy's stone

©2015 Barry Smith - I added Imagine and a leaf on this face.

©2015 Barry Smith - Now was added to this face and a leaf and definition to the front.

©2015 Barry Smith - Couple of leaves on the back with natural hard ironstone showing through

©2015 Barry Smith - Viv carefully carving her leaf forms

©2015 Barry Smith - Earth mother and leaves emerge

Some of the artists will continue to work on their stone now and then over the next month. And in a couple of months we hope to move the pieces and install them along a public walk. We are working with the Sunshine Coast Council on the relocation and installation of the works.

OK to be sad?

I had worked all morning on work-work  - so I had planned time in the studio-garage this afternoon to continue making a series of Daily Words sets - both to fill an order and in preparation for our upcoming open studio weekend.

©2014 Barry Smith - Daily words in the rough

There were to be 3 sets of Daily Leaf-words; and 4 sets of my original Daily Words. So lots of cutting circles for bowls and pieces for words - leaves and rectangles.

©2014 Barry Smith - Circles of metal for Daily Word and Daily Leaf-word bowls

Making the small 6cm long leaf forms is fiddly with the stamping folding and cutting.

©2014 Barry Smith - 21 stamped and folded leaf forms

And then hammering, annealing and unfolding the 21 leaf forms for three sets of inspirational leaf-words. But all did not go according to plan. Ten leaf-words were OK.

©2014 Barry Smith - 10 Leaf-words in the rough

But eleven split on opening - brittle metal that could not handle the unfolding process - bit sad about that.

©2014 Barry Smith - 11 busted leaf-words

I cut another batch (13 pieces) of scraps for the replacement leaves. And I tested this metal to ensure it was OK.

©2014 Barry Smith - More scrap metal for leaf-words

And to cheer myself up I cut some gorgeous metal for Peace Pendants.

©2014 Barry Smith - Metal for Peace Pendants

So you can see it is OK to be sad; but then we have to move on.