The Part Where Nothing Happens

The Part Where Nothing Happens

We've been here before. I made the base cut, and started taking care of that overhang. There was a lot of material to remove. Some of it came off with the bow saw; you can see the nice clean-cut faces.




The piece in the middle broke out with a few blows from the point chisel, and was unexpected. That's one nice thing about doing a free-form, abstract work. Losing a big chunk early on doesn't change the plan too much. Sometimes it can actually help the project along.
And, of course, there are problems and concerns. I thought that the thin red band running across the stone would make a nice feature on the finished work. But that thin red layer is soft, and mushy. And the rock is cracked along that soft red line. You can see it continuing up into the stone on the left.





Now, with alabaster, there are cracks, and there are breaks. Cracks are just a feature of the material. Breaks are, well, breaks. The stone could easily split in two, or have a major chunk just fall out. So what to do? I considered just going ahead and trying to split the rock along the crack, or sawing it in two along the line. But that would mean cutting away a good third of this piece. Another consideration is that the material on the top side of the crack in the above picture, and the flat face in the photo below is some really beautiful clear amber stuff.




Splitting or sawing could result in two separate projects, or it could mean that all that clear stuff just ends up as scrap. Either way it's a gamble. Finally I decided to flood the crack with Starbond, and forge ahead. Next was to clean up the rough edges, round out the ragged faces, and get as much of the stone smoothed out as I can. The smoothing out is usually the first thing to do, but this is still more rock than I can lift.

So here is where the project goes into the part where nothing happens. A good part of the job consists of merely staring at the stone. That's what I'm doing.










But I still don't see. It is frustrating. I am still running on very low stamina, not much energy, and little or no inspiration. The work just seems like work, and I feel like I'm trying to boil a gallon of water with a cigarette lighter. I try to keep in mind that some of the best work I did in the past began with weeks of staring at the stone until the lights went on. I am not so confident, now.

F'art class

 "Why did you bring this to school?"

The kid shifted around on the hard chair in the principal's office. He looked at the floor, and did not answer the question.
"Do you know what this thing can do? You can injure someone with it, put out an eye, and leave someone blinded for life. People have been killed with these things."
The kid continued to stare at the floor. "I wasn't going to hurt anyone with it, I just wanted to make a picture."
"You have your pad for that. All you have to do is tell it what you want to see, and it makes it perfect for you. Did you think you could do better?"
The kid felt a spark of anger, and looked up at the principal holding the sharpened rod in her fist. "All the kids have perfect pad pictures of perfect dogs and cats," he said. "I wanted one that I made myself. I don't care if it isn't perfect."
The principal replied, "You can do that at home on your own time. Here at school we do things the right way, so no one gets hurt. What if your picture was better than someone else's? They'd feel bad about themselves, and it would be your fault. You don't want your friends to feel bad, do you?"
The kid's spark of anger kindled into a flame. "I don't have any friends here, and I don't care if the other kids feel bad. I can make my own dogs and cats, or whatever. I don't care. I don't care who likes them or not."
"You don't care?" The principal had her victory. "People who don't care about others are not nice people, are they? I think maybe you need some time out so you can think about what you just said. I'm suspending you from school for a week."
That flame of anger became a light in the kid's gut. "Good!" he shouted. I hate this place anyway. Make it two weeks. And give me back my damn pencil."

 Some Trouble at the Gate

Saturday we did our Christmas party. It went quite well. Almost all of our friends came over. The house was full and noisy, and there was a bunch of food. The problem with playing host is that I seldom manage to get enough to eat at these gatherings. It's go here, talk there, go for a bite, but wait! Something or other needs done, and before I know it the evening is over, I'm dizzy tired, and I haven't stopped moving all day.

 

Then typically, I find I'm too keyed up to sleep despite being all tired out.

So my tank was less than half full when I went out, and got to work on the big rock Sunday morning.

The task of the day was simple enough. The stone has a good flat surface for a base, but there was a drill scar that ran about three quarters of the way across the flat bottom. 

I had shoved the rock around so that the drill scar lined up with the edge of the patio pavement. Even with part of the base hanging off the edge the stone sat stable. Today's task was to eliminate the drill scar, and chisel away enough stone so that I could run the base line around where I cut the material away. This would leave some rock hanging out over the edge of the base, but I figured I could work with that easily enough.

Didn't quite work out that way.

The rock still sits flat and stable, but to my eye, there is just way too much material hanging over the one edge of that base. I under-estimated just how much overhang there would be. It does not make for a pleasing form.

 

This isn't the first time something like this has happened, and I've always found some way to correct an awkward basic shape.

But along with my greatly dimished level of physical energy has come a dimished level of confidence. It feels like a major fuck-up. I shoulda' known better, planned better...

But, like I said, this is not the first time I've made a less-than-perfect move. I've got some ideas. It'll work out.

 And So It Begins

Wednesday, December 13, 2023 I wrestled the big rock out of the pile, and got it propped up at the bottom of an  eight foot long ramp of 3/4 inch plywood laid over a robust length of 2X6 board. But that was as far as I got. The rock weighs 125 pounds. I can drag and shove it around the ground, but I do not have the juice to lift it. Nor did I have the juice to work it up the ramp to the tabletop. I had to wait for Thursday when Juan came by to take care of our lawn. Even so, it did take the two of us to get the rock safely up on the table. Here it is:

And now I'm faced with a new set of problems, in getting this project underway. Ususally, the first step is to grind the surface of the rock smooth with the angle grinder. But that would mean picking it up off the table, and taking it out into the yard... No can do. Same with setting a flat base. The rock does have a flat surface, but, again- it's too heavy to do what I usually do.

So the first few steps are going to be fairly big excavations. You can see the drill hole at the left end of the base. That hole runs almost all the way across the width of the stone, and it's going to mark the outside edge of the base cut. I already tried sitting the stone flat with that straight drill line hanging off the edge of the pavement. It's quite stable, and will make for a nice, roughly round foundation for the sculpture. There's going to be some serious rock-breaking, and  heavy work with the bow saw, and point chisel coming up. Once I've cleared about thirty five, or forty pounds of rock away, I'll have something a little easier to manipulate.

This is going to be a long series. It's Friday night as I sit here typing, just putting a cap on a long day. Today was lost to housework, because tomorrow, Saturday, we're doing our Christmas open house/potluck thing. Maybe Sunday I can strike the first blows on this monster.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           

 September Stone on the Shelf

I just don't know what it is with me and titles. Most writers want a catchy title to pique readers' interests. You know- just a hint at the content, and maybe a teaser that there is going to be something titillating somewhere in the story. I just throw up whatever stupid thing pops into my head, and in this case, give away the whole plot before the first sentence is even written. So try to guess what this post is going to be about. 

Anyway, here it is.

Here's how it started:

...and how it ended up:

I've been working on the finishing for the last few days. Today was a long, long session. I'm pleased with the effort, even though I know I'll look at it tomorrow morning, and find a bunch of little things that need to be touched up. 

 I left a lot of the natural shape of the top part of the stone as it was, and went with a hand-drawn, slightly funky presentation, rather than work everything into a 'machine perfect' arc and spiral.  I have a feeling that this one may sell. I hope to get one more sculpture done before the Santa Fe Springs show this spring. But the next one has to be a big, significant effort. I've had my eye on the big stone that has been sitting weathering away in the pile for over a year now. It's a big chunky rough cube of milky translucence. I have only a vague idea of what I want to do with it, but a lot of good things start out with a sort of vague idea. Only problem is that I can't lift the damn thing. I'll think up somethin'...