I’ve been working on some music lately. It’s very much inspired by Michael Nyman, Popol Vuh, Zbigniew Preisner. I’m pretty happy with the direction the songs have been taking so far. You can check out some examples here:
They’re finally here! Extremely limited edition vinyl pressings of the second Pollimorph album Hurdy Gurd Horizons. These two covers were designed and put together by Brian Williams on a letter press machine. The paper is hand made and the colors are amazingly vibrant.
A third cover, in a slightly larger edition, is currently being worked on. Here are some in progress shots. It’s the Pollimorph logo laser cut into brown chip board record covers.
I’ve talked a lot about my sculptures on this site and a little about the movies I’ve worked on, but something I’ve yet to touch upon is the music I’ve been involved with. I’ve been playing the drums since I was a kid and I’ve had the opportunity to play with a number of talented musicians, a motley crew of glue sniffers and perverts really.
Chiefly among this group is Brian Williams, a.k.a. Pollimorph, whom I’ve known and had the great good fortune to play with for over half my life. We’ve played together in a number of groups from the early 90′s to today. In my mind the most successful of these incarnations has been Pollimorph. We recorded two albums, “Whet Thine Razorback Grimace’, and ‘Hurdy Gurd Horizons’. ‘Whet Thine Razorback Grimace’ was released on cassette tape only
while Hurdy Gurd Horizon saw release on CD
and is currently being pressed on vinyl. There will be a limited number of these records available on this site and in a few stores around Manhattan in the coming months. We have plans to record some new material in the near future.
Here is a track entitled ‘Black to Violet’ from Hurdy Gurd Horizons:
I was invited to participate in a show called Think Small which takes place every year in Richmond VA and displays work no bigger than 3X3 inches. I thought I’d do something with bees and this is what I came up with.
It’s two bees touching heads. They’re roughly 1 inch from wing to wing. This is it in red wax:
After I was happy with the wax sculpture I took it to a jeweler, Tito Castings in NYC, who proceeded to make a silicone mold and pour it in silver.
Here are some before and after clean up pictures:
Before: Notice the sprues at the base of the bees abdomens.
After:
I bought a small glass dome, from glassdomes.com, and I’m going to attempt to drill a tiny hole in the top. I want the bees to be hanging suspended in the dome. Hopefully I will have some photographs of the finished piece soon.
I think this was a good test for the larger more complicated Bee Flower sculpture I’m still laboriously laboring over. I really didn’t think the legs and antenna would come out, but Tito Castings did a beautiful job. I’ve completed two petals for one flower, the end is no where near in sight.
Info on Think Small 6
6th Biennial International Miniature Invitational Exhibition Exhibit runs from Gala Preview Opening Reception Second Reception Exhibition Catalog
email: thinksmallart@gmail.com Previous Think Small Exhibition Catalogues |
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ARTSPACE GALLERY : @ PLANT ZERO : ZERO EAST FOURTH STREET : RICHMOND, VA 23224 : 804.232.6464 all content copyright : may not be reproduced in any form without written permission |
I’ve been able to complete a bit more work on the Bee Flower sculpture. I made a mold of some real bees, using a pliable rubber called Dragon Skin, and cast them in red wax. I was able to pull bee bodies and heads from the molds, but no wings or antenna. The wings and antenna are too delicate to be poured in metal, so it’s something I’ll have to add to the final cast metal sculpture in any case.
The bees come out in wax needing quite a bit of clean up and chasing. It’s a project that’s going to take a long time, I’m estimating around 1.000 to 1,200 bees for one Bee Flower sculpture.
Here are some pictures of one petal in red wax:
The red wax is a little hard to photograph because it’s reflective, but I think this gives a pretty good idea of what it will look like.
So, it’s been quite a while since I’ve been able to write a new post. Work seems to get in the way much too often.
Just a quickie today. This is an idea I had for a new piece, that is if I can figure out how to make it work. It’s an orchid made out of bees.
Here’s a photo of some real bees placed in the shape of a few orchid petals. It’s flat and only two petals but I think it’s a pretty good rough approximation of what it will look like. I got the bees from a beekeeper, Joel, who sells honey at the local farmers market every weekend. He unfortunately lost an entire hive, but was able to give me a bunch of bees to experiment with.
And here are some pics of an orchid.
I’m thinking of doing a version where the bees are painted like bees, then another version where the bees are painted like the orchid (Patent pending). Hopefully it’ll be a trompe l’oeil type of effect, fooling the eye into thinking it’s a flower until getting closer and seeing that it’s comprised of hundreds bees.
That’s the idea anyway. We’ll see how it turns out.
Cheers,
Excerpt taken from the unpublished manuscript, ‘Materials for the Study and Classification of Variants in the Animal Kingdom with Especial Regard for those Falling Outside the Boundaries of Natural Selection’, compiled by Roger Holbien.
Pestral
There is scant information available concerning the origin of the Pestral. We do know that it is a creature which must consume or wear human flesh in order to survive. Wearing human flesh acts as a balm to their hunger, for a time at least. The more rotten the meat the more intoxicating it is for them. Eventually they will consume the meat when the smell begins to alert other animals to their presence.
The Pestral is a delicate and furtive creature with nocturnal habits. They are scavengers and live mainly in and around graveyards. A burial will occasionally bring out an almost silent swarm of Pestrals. They’re smart enough to remain undetected by most humans, lying in wait until the body is left on its own. Using their powerful claws and jaws they can burrow down to the deceased and are generally careful enough to cover their tracks. They will steal and fight with each other over the rights to the flesh.
One eyewitness account was discovered in 1892 in the archives of Father Gregory Dunn. It was penned in 1874 by an unknown source. Along with its signature, the letter’s bottom half had at some point been torn off and presumably destroyed.
“I begin to doubt my own sanity while writing these words, but I cannot continue without relating the events of three nights prior to some other living soul. We buried old Patrick Warton in the Highgate cemetery where, you may be aware, I’ve recently been employed as night watch. I believed I heard a queer sound and, going to check, I came upon a creature, no larger than a small mongrel, it had long sharp claws and a powerful jaw. It had dug a hole through the earth and into Mr. Warton’s coffin. It was emerging from this tunnel when I came upon it. It shrunk in fear as soon as it saw me, while I , in turn, was rooted to the spot. In the little monster’s hands was a long piece of meat, still covered in skin, which it had adroitly removed from the deceased’s body. The beast regained its wits, or instinct for self preservation, before I and it threw its bloody quarry over its shoulders like a shawl before escaping into the darkness. I write to you Father because I fear I may need God’s assistance in this matter. Please help. I believe I’ve steeled my nerves for another encounter and have resolved to keep…”
The letter ends here. I can find no record of any night watchman employed by Highgate cemetery in 1874.
One of my ‘Imaginary Creatures’ is getting a little closer to completion. It’s a “pestral”, a creature which must either consume human flesh, or wear it in order to survive.
Here are a few pictures:
I sculpted the bones in Super Sculpey, then baked them. Next I formed the base out of an oil clay and pushed the Sculpey into it. My next step is to make a mold, then cast it. I’ll most likely make the cast out of Aqua resin, then paint it a uniform color.
Cheers!
I want to thank everyone who braved the cold on a Wednesday night to come to the premier of Impotent at Anthology Film Archives. (There are absolutely no refunds, so please stop calling me). We’re planning on setting up another screening in the near future. I’ll post all the information on this site as soon as I possibly can.
I thought I’d list a few goals for this year that have been swimming around in the old brain box lately.
I’m hoping to get another movie into production soon. It’s entitled ‘Zero’ and it follows the fortunes of four roommates, all artists, all talented, but none of them able to support themselves by their art.
It sounds dismal from that description, but, for me, the best comedies start in that dismal, squalid place. For ex. any of Charlie Chaplin’s little tramp movies, Bruce Robinson’s ‘Withnail and I’, or Lindsay Anderson’s ‘If…”, all of which have been big influences on me.
In addition to the movie I have plans for more sculptures. I’ve been trying to figure out a way to take the ideas found in the piece ‘A Two God Universe’ and turn it into a series.
Last week I hit on the notion of 1 – writing a history, or mythology, of the gods, how they came to be and how they created the universe, 2 – Writing a history of the religion they spawned, the human aspect of the story, 3 – creating images that were constructed in their name, such as statues, drawings of temples, etc., 4 – how the religion died out, or was stamped out by both external and internal forces.
In addition to this I have two more sculpture series I really want to work on this year; ‘Fossilized Remains of Imaginary Creatures’, I’m still working on writing biographies for the creatures, and ‘Two Figures Pulling Apart’, this series will probably contain nine or ten more sculptures, you can read more about it in an earlier post.
I’m really going to have to focus my energies this year if I’m going to get any of this underway. It’s only January, so I’m still hopefull that I’ll complete a portion of these projects.
Ok, that’s all for now kids. Talk soon.