New Mobile': #47

I just finished a new mobile, #47, the 11th one I made this year. It's just under one foot high and about 8 inches wide. It's a pivot-on-point style mobile', made of steel. I used horseshoe nails for the legs of the base. The base is welded scraps of steel, and the mobile' part is a hand-worked bent and twisted steel strap. It's difficult to see in this photo but the steel ribbon is a spiral, with the pivot point going between loops in the spiral. To me, the style falls somewhere between Rustic and Industrial. I don't usually give titles to my Mobile's. I just number them but my wife, Ellen, likes to give them titles. She calls this one "Joy", which is the exact word that came to mind the first time I saw this piece in motion. I plan to clear coat this one instead of a colored paint. I like the look of the steel.
You can see a video clip of this mobile' in motion on my YouTube channel: Tesserak YouTube Channel
You can see the other 46 mobiles at my Art web site at this link: http://www.tesserak.net/html/mobiles.htm

Busy in the studio.

I've had some time to dabble in the studio. As normal, I have several projects going on at any given time. Plus, I've puttered around with a few little spur-of-the-moment projects.
I'm finishing up on the "Harmonograph #2" project. This one being a 3-pendulum device. I doesn't work as well as the original one I made a couple of months back. Still, it works, and as I've been testing and tweaking it, I've made some harmonograms (drawings made with a harmonograph). I've taken some of these harmonograms and further worked them with alcohol which dissolves some of the ink and smears it, making for some interesting images. I'll post some of them here when I'm done working them over. I'd like to donate this machine to one of our local art associations. It might make an interesting interactive art teaching tool.
I've played around making small paper/cardboard sculptures. Some of them are mock-ups for larger projects, and some are just small sculptures. This is a fun medium to play with. You can do so much with it. It is a very versatile medium, and it can be made to look like other materials.
I've been revisiting Mask making. Actually, it's a continuation; an on-going thing. The art object kind, not the wearing kind. I've made scores of them in the past, most of them smaller than a human face. I have over a half dozen that I'm working on bit by bit, here and there.
Of course there's always a mobile' or two in the works. At the moment I'm tweaking and fixing details on the last couple of mobile's I've made.
Ellen is nearly done with the costume armor she's making for her horse. She finished her armor about a year ago and has been working on the armor for the horse since then. It is nearing completion. It is looking pretty good. I'll get photos at one of the fittings sessions with her horse, soon, I hope.
I sold a painting recently to somebody who dropped into the studio unexpectedly. The painting was done in 2001, I think. It was an old one. I do want to make more paintings. I have the wall space in my gallery.
I'd like to make a few welded steel wall sculptures for the gallery too. Making a lot of little sculptures instead of a few large ones.
So, I hope to post some photos here soon showing some of the stuff mentioned above. Show & Tell is always better than just Tell when it comes to talking about Art. 

Dragon Head: update

Here's an update on the Dragon Head project. I added the eyes and a neck frill. Drilled out a hole for the eyes, surrounded with a bent metal washer. I used the same scrap metal shapes for the jaw, horns and neck frill. I'd like to add some teeth to the upper jaw and a few chin whiskers. I don't want to get too detailed with this thing. It's all kind of stylized. Too much detail would get away from that. Now I need to start looking for something interesting to use as a base for this thing. All in all, as an early attempt at welding, I'm pretty pleased with what I've got so far.
(click on an image to see a larger version of the photos)

Some new mobile's: 7/2014

I made a few new mobile's this month. Here are some photos. See more of them at my art studio web site: http://www.tesserak.net/html/mobiles.htm
The first photo is of the "Acrobats" mobile'. The second photo is another new one; red on one side, yellow on the other. The third photo is a small wire mobile' "Wire Man". 

Dragon head

Here's a photo of a work in progress: "Dragon head". Looking through my limited pile of scrap metal with which to work as I practice learning how to weld with my new welder, I came up with this idea. This is made, so far, with a one-foot long piece of T-stake (fencing stake) and some small pieces of scrap metal, which I have a small bucket full, left over from a metal shop (jaw and horn in this photo). I'm just making this up as I go. My wife thinks it would be a nice hood ornament for her "dragon truck", which she has painted with "dragon scales". I'll post more photos as this project progresses.

Hand-carved wooden spoon #5

From time to time, just for fun, and to keep my carving chops up, I like to carve a wooden spoon. I once looked at a nice wooden spoon and thought, "I wonder how hard would that be to make, and how long would it take". So, I thought I'd try.
Well, with the proper tools (a nice sharp gouge, mainly) and a lot of elbow grease, it's not particularly difficult and it takes from two to four hours depending on how hard the wood I've chosen is and how fancy you want the spoon to be. I thought I'd take some photos of the progress when I made my next spoon (that is, this one).
I've made spoons from several kinds of wood that happens to grow in my back yard. So far I've used maple, birch, plum and eucalyptus wood. So far plum made the best spoons. It's a good looking, hard wood that's not too difficult to carve. The spoon I'll be talking about here was made from plum wood.
The first thing I did was cut a slab of wood from a small aged plum tree trunk. On this blank plank I drew the outline of the spoon shape I wanted.

Then I cut the spoon shape out of the blank.

Then I took the cut-out spoon shape and clamped it to my workbench top and started to carve the bowl. This is easiest done if you cut the bowl before you carve the outside of the spoon, so that you have a flat bottom to keep the wood steady while the bowl is carved.

I moved over to a vise because it keeps a tighter grip on my work, and continue carving the bowl.

Once the bowl is roughed out, I give it a rough sanding.

Then I can start on the outside of the bowl and begin shaping it.

 Then I start on shaping the handle.

Next I begin the final sanding, from very rough to very fine sandpaper.

Finally, I finished the spoon with a couple of coats of hand rubbed boiled linseed oil. That is followed by a fine steel wool rub-down and then hand polished with a clean rag.

The final result is a nice hand carved 12" wooden spoon. Time: about 3.5 hrs. over two days.

Mobile #41

I got a welder recently so I could start working in steel. I want to make more sculpture that can be displayed outdoors. It's also a good tool and skill to have. I've been wanting to learn to weld for a long time. I waited way too long to do this. Anyway, as I'm learning, and making some really horrible looking welds, I have managed to stick together some steel. The item above, the first thing creative thing I've welded, is a small mobile'. It's made out of bits of scrap metal; nails, bolts, wire, sections of pipe, etc. . With a lot of grinding, I got it to look half decent, and with a coat of paint it really doesn't look too bad for a first attempt. The photo below is the final result. The paint is called "hammered bronze".

It's a pivot-on-point type mobile', with the top section balanced on the point of an old drill bit. The stand is made from, top to bottom: drill bit, lag bolt, washer, wire, 20d nails. The top part is made from the bottom of a spray paint can, wire, scraps of steel, and half inch slices of 1 inch sections of steel pipe. It's about 16 inches high. It's relatively heavy but it does turn in the wind.

I've started on another welded steel mobile and I'll post it here when it's finished.