Okay, I said every week, but...
In these early stages there's a lot going on, but the visuals can be less
than compelling. These trapezoidal shapes are the plates from which the large bird forms
will rise. Drilling and tapping holes in stainless steel takes time and patience.
If I was making videos of this process, this would likely be the stage composed of
lots of those x 10 speed video clips that compress time and make the work seem to fly by.
But that's not how anything gets made, really. It takes time, both for the doing and the thinking.
I learned how to treat my lift table as a tilting surface so I could get into the recesses to weld interior
seams more readily.
Clamping strategies are devised to hold these sheets in place while tacking them
together. Everything stays clamped to the table as well to prevent the warping that
even these 1/4 " plates will be prone to given the chance.
By the time all the pieces are in place this element of the sculpture
is weighing in at north of 500 pounds.
Now that it is tacked up, I start burning through through the miles of weld wire
closing up those seams.
As I close out this week it's into the great outdoors for grinding the edges
smooth and fitting the door panels to the base.
As you can see, There's still more to do at this level of refinement.
I'll be needing to do some concrete work to create the pad where building and assembly will take
place as the sculpture starts to outgrow the interior space of my studio. And I hear the Skyjack is
soon to arrive - new toys for big boys.
Till next time.
Mike Roig, Sculpture