Sculpture......Casting................only one time........

 In the early days of my college career I really didn't know where I was explicitly going....just see what was out there in th art world. I had thought that I would be a drawing major with no thoughts on what to do with the degree. I had really talented teachers, not all in the art departments, but some real scholars that taught very well and challenged us throughout their courses. 

I started at Missouri Southern and took what I could in the freshman level courses.My most talented instructor of all was John Fowler. He was the man of all talents-exceptionsl illustrator, technically and artistically top drawer within the sculpture field. John taught me the casting capabilities in fiberglass, from making the original to making a cast, and then proceeding to layer the inside of the cast with polyester and fiberglass mat. I was there for my first year and transferred  to SMS where I continued in th art department. I was in line to be a printmaker then teacher in the college level-then I took my first photography course. Haven't recovered from it as yet.

 It was a life changing event, I had a direction and a trade I could really develop in my own way. During my time at SMS I regrettably never took a course in sculpture from John Walker. He was a total craftsman elegantly producing convincing pieces of Pies and cakes oozing cherries or strawberries in different kinds of wood and steel. I was able to watch several castings of bronze pieces and picked up on the process.

I don't remember how I started the sculpture below but I left SMS with it as only a base out of wax-thinking "I can cast it at Grad school". That didn't happen. 

I graduated with my Masters in Art/Photography and was unemployable-over-educated-so I opened the studio in 1972-October in fact. Several years later Robert Allen set up his Jewelry making operation a block away from me and we started to hang out on occasion. I had watched him cast some jewelry in his centrifical casting machine made expressly for jewelry. He started soon after creating pieces that were too large for his centrifuge so we build in his garage a "casting forge." We used old bricks, fire bricks, KAO wool insulation and a glass line to heat it up. I had borrowed some wax from him and completed my wax piece from SMS, we packed it in the Plaster mold and we were off and rolling.

Talk about a road less traveled. I had never cast anything personally in bronze. I just knew the steps. On a Saturday Robert and I got together and I added vent straws to the original wax piece. These are lengths of casting wax that are attached to the original that will allow vapors from the original wax piece to pass out of the mold creating a space that will be replaced by the molten bronze. Once this is done the wax piece is slowly covered with casting plaster and given several days to dry. We set the date of the casting and I arrived with a bit of intrepidation as there is always a chance of one of the vents not being open and not allowing the molten bronze to fill the space within the mold. The casting became an all day process.

Of course we had to place our molds within the fire chamber to vaporize the wax to make room for thebronze. This process also eliminates any residue water within the plaster and brings the plaster up to temperature so that it doesn't explode with induction of the bronze. After a couple of hours since we put the pieces in the chamber we started to heat up the bronze. Robert had all of the equipment to complete this task and it wasn't terribly long before we had a crucible full of molten bronze. We slid the top off of the casting  chamber and poured in the liquid bronze. Several popping sounds of agravated plaster but nothing out of the unusual. We waited several hours and liberated the pieces. After a cleaning process to remove residue from the piece we then heated it to add liver of sulfur liquid to tarnish the bronze and tone down the gold look. I was delighted with the "look" but then thought of how ro display it.

I stopped at a local cemetery monument company and told them I needed a piece of granite to use for a display if one of my sculptures. I selected one, took it to my studio, outlined the shape of the piece giving it about a 1/2 margin on the edges and about a 1/2 inch depth to place the sculpture in. Long live epoxy glue.

This sculpture is the only bronze I have ever cast, however I still have a bunch of casting wax left. I may start another just to get something going.....