Yay! a Fail Whale card!
I’m really happy – Yiying Lu sent me one of her cool Fail Whale cards! Here it is with my little sculpture. Thanks so much Yiying :)
Archive for the 'sculpture' Category
Giant wire marionette in Vancouver
(photo credit: stephenccwu)
This huge wire marionette appeared at the opening of the new Vancouver Convention Centre last weekend; I gather it was associated with Cirque du Soleil. It was a performance by the Underground Circus, and the marionette was made by Peter Boulanger (who was kind enough to let me know in a comment below). It’s made of aluminium (I guess it’s really thick round wire?) , and at about 40 feet, billed as the tallest marionette in Northern America. The puppet moves to music and is operated by 5 puppeteers working pulleys. In this photo you can see it standing fully, supporting two acrobats: the one in the ball and one on the length of material. This is a great photo of it, too.
(influence of Royal de Luxe? Peter says not directly, though he knew of their work)
Messy
This is what my studio looks like at the moment. I’m making a large dead manta ray out of polystyrene. I wish it wasn’t so messy and that I didn’t have to wear a respirator all day, but it works nicely.
3D Illustration
Chris Sickels at Red Nose Studio makes real figures and scenarios that are then photographed to produce cool 3D illustrations for papers, magazines and books. The 3D illustration above is his cover for Cory Doctorow’s story The Things That Make Me Weak and Strange Get Engineered Away. Before seeing this I had thought of 3D illustration as more a virtual rendering process. In this real form it is closely, and interestingly, allied to my work making puppets and props. I recently had a picture of my 3D fail whale published as an illustration in the Japanese computer magazine WEB+DB PRESS. I suppose that is fairly close – the only difference is in your intention when you start making an object?
(via @LolaLulu)
Giant Helicoverpa caterpillar
I’m catching up some blogging on work projects that I have ignored for a while. This is a big model of a Helicoverpa caterpillar and leaf that I made for CSIRO Plant Industry in Canberra a few months ago. There’s a photoset of the making process, with notes along the way. The Helicoverpa caterpillar is the main pest in the cotton industry.
Working on a shell
I’ve promised myself to try to focus more on projects of my own, in between contract work for other people. I find it so easy to fritter time away when I’m not meeting other’s deadlines. So I’ve started back working on a big shell project I first started over 3 years ago. Back then I got as far as sculpting the shell out of clay, and making a ridiculously big and heavy plaster mold of it. It’s about a metre long. Luckily I did have the sense then to make a cradle on casters for it, so I don’t break my back trying to maneuver is around.
A few days ago I sealed the plaster with layers of shellac, which turned it this beautiful golden mustard colour.
Now I am paper mache-ing it inside with tissue paper. I want it to look flimsy and papery and almost transparent, but I don’t know how few layers I can get away with, and still have it come out of the mold intact. The idea of using very fine fibreglass is tempting, but I am sworn off working with fibreglass.
There are a few more photos at Flickr, where I’m making a photoset.
Wandering
I’m lucky to be in Paris for a month, over half gone now. We are living a 15 minute train ride out of the city, and I love my Carte Orange transport card. Once paid it has basically given me free range across the whole city by whichever public transport suits best. It is really efficient for me, except when there are rail strikes. I gather this is relatively often – there was one day this week when the trains weren’t running.
I’ve been doing a lot of wandering on foot, too – through various districts like the M’s – Montmartre, Montparnasse, and the Marais – and others. The other day I walked from the Arc de Triomphe back into the centre down the Champs-Elysee, through Place de la Concorde, and Jardin des Tuileries.
Today I satisfied my curiosity about La Defense, the modern financial district, spending the afternoon there, looking at all the amazing architecture, glass reflections and contemporary sculptures that are dotted all the way through the buildings and walkways there.
Place Igor Stravinski
Here are some photos of the playful fountains just to the south of the Centre Pompidou, in Place Igor Stravinski. Most of them move, for instance the big lips make a slow mechanical nod, and others turn while spouting water. They were created by Niki de St-Phalle and Jean Tinguely. The graffiti snake was high up on one of the walls surrounding the square; I like that it reflects the snake in the fountain.
When I was there, aside from the coffee drinkers, lots of people were sketching, a bunch of boys were playing football, and some other kids were playing an elastics game.
Jean Dubuffet
I’m seeing and liking quite a lot of artwork by Jean Dubuffet here in Paris. This kind of cave of his, called Le Jardin d’hiver, took my fancy, and I spent a while in it. It’s lumpy and bumpy and the lines don’t always go where you might expect them too. The little girl in the photo was really enjoying it.
The bride
This was the most intriguing sculpture I saw in the Centre Pompidou the other day, La mariee, by Niki de Saint Phalle.
