Interlochen Summer Camp Floating Sculptures

Sculpture Exhibition on Green Lake.

This past summer (2011) I taught a High School Sculpture class at Interlochen Center for the Arts. It's a summer camp dedicated to music, dance, and visual arts. 

My class was called "Sculpture: Welding and Construction Techniques". It was a three week crash course in welding. I wanted to do something a little off-the-cuff after all that serious welding.  The lake the camp was next to was so pretty, I thought it would be a shame not to use it.  I assigned the class to make floating sculptures. This was the last assignment and they had only about three days to make something that could float and be sculptural. The pulled it off and we got into canoes and launched them into the Green Lake.

I fabricated these little hardcore anchors and tied them to each students' sculpture.

Myself with assistants Harrison Tyler and Christina Quinlin, best assistants ever!

Rosie's kinetic  floating sculpture spun like a pin wheel.

A view from a canoe.

Emily's was a re-purposed painting easel.

Harrison made one too. 

Another canoe shot of the spinning Rose.

Markus made two that were tied together.

Brittney's Sea Monster.

Brittney's became a turtle habitat, can you see it?

While teaching a sculpture course and being the Studio Technician, I didn't find a lot of time to make my own work. I have to say that seeing these sculptures on the lake gave me the same satisfaction as if I had made some work. I said to myself, out on the canoe, "this is why I got my MFA".  

VanDeSculpture

R   I    P    

Lil' Pick-em-up Truck

My Ram50 after being brutally rammed from behind.

I was really happy with my 1989 Dodge Ram 50. It was the mightiest little-est pick-em-up truck that I ever did see. It was able to haul so much in it's 4 cylinder Mitsubishi engine. I've seen many a big truck wasting gas by hauling just one vain person around around. I'd have mine overloaded with sculpture. This past March it got hit from the rear-ended as it sat in front of my apartment. They hit it so hard that we found it up on the yard. This was just too much trauma for the old-boy.  What, at first, looked like a cosmetic-only damage, ended up messing up the motor's already old gasket-head.  A few drives later and it was dead, unable to even start.

When one door closes another opens.

I found the van in Craigslist: 1987 Dodge Ram 150. It's a UNCW service van with 40k, a ladder rack, cool blue paint, and plywood-lined floor. The engine is a Slant 6, an engine so reliable that they stopped making them because they never died. It rides like a boat and I mean that in a good way, like you know how it feels good to ride on a boat? Relaxing? That's this van.  

I needed a vehicle I could haul sculptures across state lines with. This has enough space to fit multiple large-ish sculptures in it. I built this loft in it that is removable and able to be strapped to the roof rack. I built the bottom space big enough that Revolvedogasana (see last blog post) fits in it and still have the loft to put another sculpture of the same size! This not only enables me to take twice as many sculptures, but I can sleep in there too. It's about a double-sized mattress.  This is important because gas is around $3.80 a gallon right now and this gets about 15mpg. That was another good thing about the lil truck was that it was good on gas.  

Mario enjoying a grape soda.

Stud showing off the "love-loft".  

Andy with his Dream Machine. 

The guy I bought this from said that he bought it for his son, who didn't want it because it looked too creepy. There is no way to make this van not look like the worst-type-of-van you can think of. I don't care, ya'll can have your cool and mascalating trucks, but when it rains, my tools and load will be dry as a bone and secure from bandits.

I need a name for the van. Do you have any suggestions? 

Dream Machine

Mystery Machine

Van Morrison

Van Lear Rose

Rip Van Wrinkle

Sculpture Van

Vandistan?

Thanks for your time.

Revolvedogasana

I have entered this sculpture into Art Prize, which is like the Olympics of public art, held annually in Grand Rapids Michigan. There are about a half million dollars worth of awards that are split up by 10 or so artists and these are voted by everyday Grand Rapidians and the 8 million visitors(!) that ascend upon the town.  Another twist to this is that the artists and venues create profiles on the websites. The venues browse the artists and contact one to work with. Very different exhibit. I have the chance to win a prize, sell the piece, get exposure to a huge crowd, yet I have to drive to Michigan. Twice. Sort of a gamble.

I'll be posting pieces now from my thesis exhibition with their descriptions. This will help me get into the habit of writing on this blog and its a good way for you to see what has been on mind this past year or so.

7H x 3W x 2D Powder-coated aluminum and steel.

This sculpture depicts a yogini, or female asana practitioner, in a posture called Parivrtta Parsvakonasana, which means “revolved side-angle pose”.  Looking upward with her in this yoga posture is her pet dog.  They are connected by a branching fire emanating between their eyes.

The yogini is lunging deep with her right leg, while twisting and pressing her palms into each other to aid in the twist.  The hands are both in a praying hand gesture and an athletic hold.  The difference between calling this a mudra (symbolic hand gesture) and merely calling it an athletic hold is a small part of a central issue within contemporary yoga.  The argument is whether yoga is an exercise or religious practice and then also, whether yoga should be practiced with dogs (or pets). This sculpture enlivens this debate by showing what a yoga practitioner could look like in a moment of meditation, enlightenment, or euphoria through exercise with a dog.

The pastel-fluorescent green of the dog and person are an optical aura.  As a more challenging yoga posture, it seems appropriate for there to be a rougher texture, because this pose will make a practitioner shake if held for a long period of time.  The connecting emanation turns from the cool green into a red flame with neon pink highlights.  The cloud pedestal alludes to the incredibleness of this situation.