Harmonograph #2

Here's a look at Harmonograph #2, a 3-pendulum device. The 'table' stands about 30 inches high. The drawing surface is about 48 inches high. The black rectangle is where a sheet of paper is fastened. It is on a pendulum which hangs from a gimbal, allowing a circular or elliptical swing. The other two pendulums each swing on a single plane but at right angles to each other. Where these two arms come together there is a hinge which holds the pen (near the red spring-clip). The frequency of each pendulum is determined by the height of the weight on the bottom section of each pendulum arm.
This harmonograph doesn't work as well as my first one, which clamps to a table top. There is too much 'play' and friction in various parts of this machine, which all adds up to dampening and sapping of the energy of the pendulum swings. These problems are resolvable without redesign or rebuild. A smaller, lighter drawing pad. Lighter drawing arms and much lighter hinge. Stiffer legs. Those would all help.
I don't have a video clip of this one yet but I do have a few scans of drawings done on it. See below.

A simple harmonogram (a harmonograph drawing, 8.5 x 11 paper).

A more complex harmonogram

The simplest type of harmonogram, with all the weights set at the very bottom of the pendulum.

 The drawings below were made while I was setting up and tweaking the harmonograph. I made one drawing on top of another to save paper. So the drawings have a kind of child-like imperfection, with wobbly, scratchy, jerky lines, skips and stutters. I thought some of them were interesting, and that I could make them more so by reworking them a bit. A lot of the lines were made with Sharpie pens, so I dribbled rubbing alcohol in spots here and there on the pages, which made the ink dissolve and run in interesting ways. Here are a few examples:

Example 1: these were done on 8.5 x 11 paper

Example 2

Example 3

On Mobile's #2

About half of the sculptures I make these days are Mobile's. I think about them a lot. They are fascinating to watch, challenging to design (a good one), and, I think, much more interesting than they appear at first glance.
A well made mobile' is interesting to watch. It's not just some thing hanging there dangling and jangling in the wind, or some kind of fancy whirligig. A good mobile' will captivate you. Watching one can be a relaxing, soothing experience. Unlike most mechanically driven sculpture, which have repetitive, cyclical patterns of movement, Mobile's move with chaotic unpredictability. There may be a limited variety of movements but they are slightly different each time they happen.
I like the unpredictable nature of a mobile'. They are powered by the natural forces of air currents and gravity, moving in ways that, at times, seem contrary to what we, the observer, are feeling. Yet even when motionless, the mobile' is an interesting sculpture, never (or, with some Mobile's, always) resting in the same position.
Light can be an important factor as well. For most other kinds of sculpture we don't pay much attention to their shadows but for some Mobile's, their shadows add a good deal to the show. Natural or artificial lighting can be used to great advantage in this respect. Add colored glass to the mobile' and you'll get moving, colored shadows that change shape. Make a mobile' out of mirrors, and not only will you have elements that change color as the move, you'll also get a kind of Disco-Ball effect from the light reflecting off the mirrors. If the mobile' is lit by sunlight, it will look different throughout the day, taking on the color of the sunlight as it changes.
I wasn't thinking along these lines when I designed and built it, but I was watching one of my Mobile's one day when it occurred to me that what I'd done is, I made a toy for Nature to play with. I was watching wind, gravity and light play, or as I like to think, dance with the mobile'. Further pondering made me realize that everything we humans make are Nature's toys. Nature: the supreme Quality Assurance Tester. If there are flaws, she will find them.
We don't tend to think of a Mobile' as an engineering project but it is one. A mobile' is a system of linked, balanced objects. The energy in the motion of each linked and balanced section is transferred to the next section as the first one reaches the end of its range of motion, and so on through the succession of links in the chain. Or each section (or only some sections, if you choose) may have complete range of motion, so that each section (or element) is independent of each other, thereby not effecting the ones linked to them. In addition, one needs to decide if any of the elements will collide with each other. It may or may not be desirable. There are so many variables to consider along the way when designing a mobile', it can consume a great deal of thought. I've found Mobile's to be a much more interesting and deeper subject than I expected.
See my Mobile's on my Art web site: Tesserak Mobile' Page

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.