Untitled Art Show

Tonight I will be a guest on www.UntitledArtShow.com at 8 PM mountain time. It will also be in the archives as a podcast for future listening.

Obama, again.

Reworked bust.

Pioneers

This is a Cooper and Cunningham piece; sculpted by me, art directed by DiAnne Cooper.

Scottsman

This is a Cooper and Cunningham piece. Sculpted be me, minus the faithful sidekick Scottie sculpted by DiAnne Cooper, who also did the art direction.

The MAXXI

Cooper and Cunningham put together a proposal of what could be the coolest piece of public art ever for The MAXXI (National Museum of 21st Century Art, Rome, Italy). The concept design was done by Brian Cooper. I sculpted the maquettes shown, and included the color sketch to show the whole composition. There are more maquettes done by Levi and Randy, and if you'd like to see them email me-they are ridiculously cool. The reason I am not including them in this post is that a lot of people only look at the photos(I'm often guilty of the same) and reasonably assume anything I put on here is my work. Anyway, wish us luck!

St. George's Cathedral

We here at Cooper and Cunningham, submitted a sculpture proposal for St. George's Cathedral in Perth, Australia. It is an international competition, and you can vote for your favorite on their website until February 21st.
http://www.sculptureproject.org.au/
Ours is on the second page, and you can read more about it there. The dragon would be 12' tall in bronze, and spraying the shield of 8' tall bronze St. George with water, illuminated to look like fire.
For your viewing pleasure, here are photos of the maquette. The concept was done by Brian Cooper, I sculpted the Dragon, and DiAnne sculpted St. George. It is 1/10th scale.

Elka of Elko

Update: Here she is in the museum!

















This is the process of creating Elka the Elephant in bronze.
This a model of the internal armature.













The shape is bulked out with insulation material and covered in plaster bandages.


















Clay is applied over the plaster and sculpted to it's final shape, then molded. I was primarily responsible for Elka's ears, some of the wrinkles, the bones on the ground, and the miner's (Sven) head and hands, but it's difficult to claim anything as my own as we all touched all parts of this piece (which is why it's fun!)


















Moldmaking is messy! The aftermath...













This mold was about 30 pieces.













Wax is poured into the molds, creating a positive duplicate (this is one of her feet).













Another mold is made of ceramic, in which the bronze is poured.













The pieces are welded together and sandblasted.













A patina created using chemicals and heat is applied to give it the final color.

















Currently, Elka is being mounted to her base and shipping to her new home at the California Trails Museum. The dedication is January 27, after which I will post the last photos.

I have been to Coopingham and back

For those tens (at least) of you who wondered where I've been, this post is for you.

Awhile back I met DiAnne Cooper at the Faraut workshop. She is a brilliant sculptor, project manager and you should just check out here website, www.dlcoopersculpture.com. She and Levi Cunningham (brilliant designer of exhibits and furniture, and mad paper-folder) form Cooper and Cunningham, creators of public art, interpretives, and environmental design. They gave me the opportunity to work with them, so I relocated my studio into our beautiful warehouse in August. I work as a sculptor with DiAnne, Levi, and Randy Buckle (a man of many talents, particularly in drawing, sculpting, trivia and music playlist creation) to create large scale works of art.

The first project we completed as a team will be installed in the California Trails Museum in Elko, Nevada this month. It's an interpretation (designed by DiAnne) of an etching done in the 1800's depicting "Seeing the Elephant." This was an expression used when heading out West, meaning seeing things one had never before seen. I will do a separate post showing the process.

We have also been working on a monument that DiAnne and Levi were awarded by the City of Thornton-it will be 16' tall bronze and I won't say anything other than check back for updates because it is a seriously stunning piece.

Thanks for checking back in!

Colorado Animules

For the Show 'Paper or Plastic' at 910 Arts. A show during the DNC which encourages both artists and viewers to consider our small daily choices and their impact on our physical environment. Participating artists must discuss an aspect of the materials they use to create the art.

I drew all Colorado native animals on Colorado beetle-kill, or 'blue-stained' pine.

Drawings from Dr. Sketchy's Anti-art school...I wish it was more than once a month!

Faraut Workshop

I took a workshop a few weeks ago with master sculptor, Philippe Faraut. It was incredible and I'd recommend it in a second to anyone who is interested in sculpting figures. My first portrait wasn't a great success (as you can see), but I learned a lot, met some great people, and thoroughly enjoyed it.

From work today...

Rockies mag

This is a 2 page spread of some of the Rockies first draft picks, to be in the August 2008 issue. Verrry short deadline, I would have liked to do more, but there's a point when you gotta call it done!

Nocturnal Mockery and Metronome

Work for shows during the past 2 weekends...and UPDATE! Photo of the Lovely Rosemary and her new painting.

Ruby

Relief on board.

Figure sketch

2 hrs. Water-based clay.

Obama sculpt

For comment, see title.

Obama

Woodrow

You might recognize this guy as part of my website interface. I modified him to fulfill the second part of a commissioned illustration, which was a fable of sorts involving a woodchuck and a opossum.

Reworks

Repainted her












Based them

Me

Self-caricature done in Photoshop on my new tablet PC (oh, boy!).

Funky jewelry-

Downtowner

Downtowner Magazine did an article about the artists in my building-here's my page!

Snow Goddess

Okay, a couple more. I love the first one-it's the first day of the con before the ballroom opened, so it started just outside the doors.

NCN Con 2007

My work from the week.

Taste of Colorado

These are from a festival I worked last weekend for 4 days. The booth...















...and the artwork...I took a few more pics, but these are my favorite-especially the top two here...
























I also had my first 'pet gig' drawing dogs and whatever other animals people brought into the pet store. I drew 2 mice, a ferret, a bird, and lots of pooches. It's pretty hard to get a good sketch of a mouse when it's running around it's 6" plastic ball in case you ever wondered.

Last day at the park?

Co-workers and a bad photo of a couple on a blind date. He tipped me $16. I told her to go out with him again.

Random stuff

3 park sketches. The little blue-eyed boy caught my eye from across the midway-I went over and asked his dad to please let me draw a demo of him. He did, then bought it and tipped me 5 bucks. Nice. I just wanted to check out this kids eyelashes-this photo doesn't do him justice.

The baby is Sergi, my friend Alyssa's chubby boy. This is my first 2-d airbrush painting, in which I discovered how easy it is to overwork. I went back and forth with value more than I will share before finally accepting and ceasing.

As for the little girl witht he unicorn-she was too cute not to share. She couldn't put the mirror down when she saw it.

Makeup and chair work

Makeup I did for a photoshoot for my friend Lesley's apparel line http://www.brainchildapparel.com/








...And park sketches from recent days. I've only worked 2 days in the past 2 weeks and have had a hard time getting into the zone. I can see a lot of repetition and crutches in these pics, but that's why it's good to have them. Still, there is something in each that I like.