Dust

On numerous occasions when I have demonstrated at various venues I talk about stopping the lathe regularly to remove the shaving/dust from the inside. At a demo I will stop the lathe and hook out the small amount of shavings with my fingers or a bent spoon. Nearly every time I do this some one says with a wise tone " you wanna get an air hose in there, save you loads of time" or words to the effect of.

I never use an air hose to blow down the dust from my work surfaces or to blow out dust/shavings from the inside of a form not since I went to a Health and safety workshop free of charge by the HSE here in the UK. Basically an air hose for this sort of process is shunned upon as it blows all of the settled dust into the air.

The best method to adopt is the use of a vacumm cleaner. A simple attachment can be mase to fit into the end of the hose to go into any hollow form. 


Any way I found this small video on the HSE web site and thought I would post.

Happy turning

Latest Update

A while ago I posted that I was intending to change direction with my work and will be moving into a more sculptural group of works marketed specifically towards the exclusive interior market.

The previous piece is the start of this journey as is the background/networking I have been involved in behind the scenes.

Recently I had contact with Trowbridge Gallery who currently are located in London, Castle Cary, Atlanta and High Point, North Carolina.

Well I made an appointment to visit the gallery in Castle Cary in order to take a long some of my more sculptural pieces. It was recived very well and I have been asked to produce a group of works for both the Castle Cary Gallery and the London Gallery, Kings Road.

This is a very exciting time, for my work to be accepted for sale in such prestigious locations makes all the work in the last twelve years worth it.

In order to market my designs I now have a second web site 'The Design Collection'.

The moves I have been working on hard in the background have deliberately been kept close to my chest for obvious commercial reasons.

So now I will be burning the candle at both ends again to get the work finished and off delivered to the new gallery's.

Mixing it up

The base for the last piece got me thinking about the rest of my work and how I can make it perhaps more interesting from a sculptural point of view.

A lidded for on its own is a pleasing form but by adding it to the base for the previous piece adds a nice dimension.

So I am going to play around with the different aspect from each group of works to see how I can develop them further.

Finished

Finally here is the finished piece. Well I say finished as being the first there are things that I may or may not change. It will have to sit on the side board for a week or two so that I can muse over it's various parts.

The form is around 10 inches wide x 8 inches high. The base rocks and the idea is that the piece balances on its own. The main form is fixed to the base and the curved accent sits down into the teeth on either side. I am not sure that I am overly happy with this part and alter or adapt the idea. The original material that I wanted to incorporat for the accent came with various problems, most of which I was able to get around but not fully. So more work with this is needed.

The main form is hollow just like any other hollow form. The carving and texturing was included to add movement to the piece and took by far the most time with around 3500 individually textured lines being added by hand.

This is a new series that I am developing and as such this being the first was a real test in relation to the techniques involved with many of them being made up as I went along. A great deal has been learnt and this will hopefully hold me in good stead for the next one.

In all I calculate 15-18 hours has been spent on the piece. This amount of time was mainly down to it being the first and my feeling the way through it.

The next one is already designed but will have to wait a while as I have other projects to get started and finished.

Past the half way point

The  picture here is of the latest piece that I have been working on. I would say that I am past the half way point but there is still a lot of work to do.

The main form has now been textured and colour to add more depth to the piece.

It has been an interesting project. For some time now I have wanted (as I have said in previous posts) to change direction to more sculptural work. I wanted somthing unique that I had not seen before and with this piece believe I have found it. The the idea  has not come of any other work by any other maker and happened purely by accident and was very much a serindipity moment which has made the whole process more exciting.

Amongst the excitment there has also been several dreaded moments where I was not sure if what I was attempting would work at all. On these occassions I found thinking about going back to working within my safe zone but realised that if I did not push myself  that I would possibly not progress the piece, ( I even had a sleepless night worrying about if it was going to work or not.

This has been a frightening experience but also very excillerating. I am not sure if you can get an adrelalin rush from creating but I have certainly felt one during the making of this piece .

The carving and texturing have taken around 11 hours to date not including the making of the main form and other parts so I guess around 15 hours in total have been racked up.


Hopefully the end result will be worththe work put in. Obviously showing the piece in such a clandestine way with snippets here and there could be a recipe for my failing and falling from a great height. But one thing I have learnt through out my short time making and in previous vocations is that without taking risks I can't push the apron.

Failing is a big part of the process and I have had to alter my intentions as I have continued. Some things worked some did not, but the amount learnt is worth all the sweat and anxiety.

So  another 4-5 hours work and it should be complete, but even if it does not turn out as I intend then I will post pictures to show the end result.

You may ask why I have included information about how excilerating and frieghtening this process has been. Well a fellow creative maker who has help and continues to help me challenge the way I think told me a long time ago that as a maker I need to continually challenge and push outside of my comfort zone, to explore and investigate nw ways of working and that only by doing this will I move forward.

So this blog entry and process is more about how I have tackled the project that the physical form itself and hopefully it will give others an insight into how I am working more and more.

Progressing

Today I have been working all day on the first of the new series of work I have been developing. Many hours have been spent on the carving and refining and quite a few more to go. In the above picture there is the addition of a fabricated/cut/sanding piece of wood which adds a different dimension to the piece.

Working on th first of any piece is as much a learning curve of "how to do it", as much as anything else. Often when making how I percieve I will make a piece changes as I go along with new ancillery tools being made to make the job easier.  Also while working on this piece a few more in the series have come to light which is an exciting feeling as I know that when I finish this piece I can get straight into the next which is already simmering in the back of my mind.

Hopefully post some more pictures soon when it is finished but ther is quite alot of work to do.

Next

The piece I am working on at present is the first in a new series of sculptural forms with the lathe being used for a small part of the process after which carving, colouring and other media will be added, there is a lot of refining to do with the carving currently being in a raw state.

It has taken me some time in fact many years to get to this stage of evolution within my work so I will not be showing the stages or the item until completely finished. The picture is a preview of the carving produced to date within a section of the piece.

Of course it may turn out to be a complete failure but without trying I won't know.

A few more

Most of my time at the moment is being spent as previously mentioned finishing pieces that have been on the shelf for a while. Here are some more that have been finished in the last few days.

A few pictures include pieces seen before but I have been experimenting with my camera trying out new ideas in relation to taking a few more interesting photo's for my web site.

The below two forms are sycamore, 140 mm dia x 130 mm high with anjan lids, finials and silver beads.

 This one is again sycamore and has been buffed with no top finish as yet being applied. It is ready to have the lid and finial made which will be over the next few days. It measures 200mm high x 190 mm dia.

 

 

Stone and Wood

Here is the textured form that I have been working on finished to include a lid, bead and finial.  The lid incorporates the same stone as the finial which was carved from a solid piece, you may recognise the carved stone form from from the last posting. The whole piece is around 6 inches diameter x 6.5 high

In the end I decided not to colour the body and to leave the natural carbon colour of the pyrography to show through to contrast with the wood. Some times I can over work a piece so often a minimalist approach is better for me,  I can then spend time looking at it and build/develop it in my minds eye for the next project.

The carving of the finial from stone was no more complex than carving  in wood, although there are a few different methods of working the material.

The finial will be replicated into a much larger organic sculpture out of either stone, wood or both and will be the starting point for my organic sculptures that I am going to continue making from long ago. originaly before taking up turning in a big way I produced numerous similar sculptures and have a new enthusiasm for dipping back into this.

Indeed this was how I came up with the carved wooden finials as a large sculpture would take me quite a while in comparison and I did not have the patience due to workin full time so a piece would take several weeks to complete. So I started making small carved finials as a way to keep my interest going with the carving.

Now I make for a living I can take as long as I like (within reason) and market towards a different customer base.

You can see from the  picture below that there are some lovely colours within the stone so I will be sourcing much larger pieces for carving in the future.

Here is the same piece on a neutral background so you can see it without distraction.

The form below is one of the numerous pure forms that I am finishing off so there will probably be quite a few more posted. It is around 5 inches diameter.

Will post some more of bits and pieces I am working on soon.

Fruit full few days

Yesterday I I decided to start finishing some of the eighty odd unfinished forms that I have in my workshop as several galleries are chomping at my heels to produce more work.

So the piece at the top was finished with the main form being made from spalted silver birch measuring around 280 mm dia x 220 high.  It has an Anjan lid and carved finial with brass bead.  Haven't made any of these for a while as I had interests in other work. But needs must so I am finishing some off.

But I doubt I will make many more pure forms such as this as I prefer now to add texture etc.

Also started working carving stone which is an enjoyable change to wood and I expect I will be working in it more and more.

This piece is not very large and an experiments for bigger pieces to see how the tools that I have work or not as I have found in some instances.