2nd sculpture part finished.

[Mark Sanger]

Hi all

This is the second sculpture I have been working on. It is part finished.  Main profile/shape turned, then the internal area carved using dremel, burrs, chisels, files, etc, It has just had its first few coats of acrylic.

Picture is pants as you can't pic up the areas designed to hold the shadows. Tasken outside, sun too bright, but a bit rushed at the moment.

If finished in time this one will be at Loughborough.

C&C welcome.

Thanks for looking.

[Bryan Milham]

Mark,

if you tell me there's some lathe work in there somewhere I'll believe you.

I can see all sorts of things in the piece, swan, hook, scoop etc., I can also see why you had trouble photographing it in natural light. Those curves definitely need directed lighting to bring them out.

What is the base it's on?

I know it is probably a temporary one but I ask as it reminds me of a Celcon block (lightweight building blocks) we used to carve them at school for small sculptures. Easy to work with, they literally do cut with a blunt knife (or in fact anything from a thumbnail upwards).

I'd forgotten about that stuff until I saw this - Now that's got me thinking.

[Mark Sanger]

Hi Bryan

Thanks for he comments. Your comments about there being some lathe work in there somewhere made me chuckle. The whole of the outside profile was turned on the lathe.

You need to think a bit differently than normal and how we use the lathe. The technique is very old, there are in fact two ways in which to produce pieces like this both several hundreds of years old.

Just because you can't see it does not mean it is not so.

get your thinking cap on Grass Hopper.  



The base is a piece of 2 x 3 x 8 inch sawn sycamore used to bang a few nails to push the sculpture onto for colouring.  

[woodndesign]

Swan .. yes .. idea after ice cream at Abbotsbury Swannery ..

The lathe may revolve on one axis, but the work can be turned on many.

Cheers   David

[Mark Sanger]

Swan .. yes .. idea after ice cream at Abbotsbury Swannery ..

The lathe may revolve on one axis, but the work can be turned on many.

Cheers   David

It indeed does look like a swan, but no it was not inspired by Abbotsbury, but a nice idea.


In relation to how, you'll have to be more specific, but yes it can, but no.

[Mark Sanger]

Well that killed it. 

[bodrighywood]

I can see how it could be done using multi centres, whether that is what you have done I couldn't say. However you did it I love the lines of it. Like a lot of things it looks quite a simple shape but hard to achieve to this standard. Swan, a flower , eye of the beholder again LOL

pete

[Bryan Milham]

No matter how I look I can't see an Axis of Symmetry around which it would have revolved!

[The Bowler Hatted Turner]

Hello Mark,
             very nice and very clever, I do not wish ruin the mystique but I think I know how you did it. Not necessarily hundreds of year old as if it is the technique I think it is we used to do it when I was apprenticed.
(Alright, so that is nearly half a century ago).
Very good indeed and thanks for making us think.
regards
John
BHT

[Mark Sanger]

The technique used to produce this is an adaptation of a technique first used in 1810 within woodturning.

Thank you for your interst.

Bryan, next time I am at the club I will tell you how it is done.

John if you are at the seminar we can discuss. It is so simple you will kick yourself. Of course it may be the same as you think.

In the mean time this a chap I saw at the AAW symposium, uses different techniques but produces mesmerising sculptural forms using the lathe. I can only hope.http://weidmanwoodsculpture.com/

[Francesco Dibari]

... i love your elegant style .. many compliments .. 

[Mark Sanger]

... i love your elegant style .. many compliments .. 

Thank you very much.

[Clavico]

Very beautiful, Mark!

Robert

[Mark Sanger]

Very beautiful, Mark!

Robert

Thanks Robert.

I have just finished the base with it's last coat of paint so hopefully I will photograph it tomorrow to show. Spraying pure white and pure black has been a real pain in the arse I have to say. Should have left the wood grain showing would have been much easier.