Sculpture

I (Steve) have been interested in sculpture all my life. When I was a kid I made models out of plasticine and pipe cleaners. I was never really interested in things like airfix kits, only stuff envisaged and made from raw materials. At the age of 16, in 1967, I went to Art School for a year. Apart from temporarily losing what faith I had in my ability, the main thing I got out of it was the joy of working in three dimensions and with printing techniques.

I made an occasional something over the years, out of wood, play dough, sand or snow, some more realistic, some abstract. A weekend course at the Sculpture Lounge rekindled my interest in metal sculpture and I’ve become steadily more involved with it. The first thing I made was a mobius strip based sculpture and several of the works below in the same weekend. I’ve been adding to the collection and have been getting the odd request. This year I decided to make a butterfly for someone and in the process Ruth requested one for our garden at the same time.

Wayne’s Ringlet

Our Ringlet

As a result of the popularity of these attempts, I recently I hired extra time in the studio to try to bring about a vision I had for a host of butterflies. I added Comma to the original Ringlet. These are popular so I will make some more.

Ringlets and Commas outside the Sculpture Lounge studio

One of the butterflies from above now ‘ripening’ in our garden

Here are some more examples.

Toad and Lily Pads from ailing cherry tree

Late sun in the garden, spoon insect with Double Strip Mobius in the background

Most Recent Post

Art that Evolves

I had a discussion the other day about the fact that people often pay good money to have something look like it has rusted with age, the fashionable use of Corten steel being an example. I have a love of letting sculptures develop as they will over the years, with minimal interference and restoration. Wooden ones sometimes need more attention but I love the way the metal ones change. Different metals have different characteristics and alloying and oxidisation processes affect that. I think the sculptures have a better feel and texture if left to evolve, with minimal interference, though lately I have been using a weak oil paint and linseed oil mix on parts of them to slow and subtly alter the changes.

Here are some examples.