New Assemblage for 2018

A New Assemblage I've been working on for 2018
30"x 20"x 7"
Titled - I Can't Keep My Eyes Off You.
Another meditation on impermanence.

This one took me awhile to complete I don't know if it was because I was struggling with what materials to use/ how to use them or the fact that I was back surfing again and that burned up some of my creative time in the day. I have to keep telling myself that I should have no preconcieved notions on what a sculpture should look like. I want to combine and juxtapose whatever materials I deem important to the final result. I'm trying to get away from allowing the shape of the material I use in the sculpture to determine the final look. I looking for something amorphous,  something like an exploded diagram of a three dimensional object.

I'm trying to get away from allowing myself to be lured into putting things into the four surfaces of a container like some of my older pieces.

New sculpture/assemblage Search for Your Invisible Heart

Unveiling another sculpture of mine this one is 3 feet tall and 2 feet wide.  Still not done, I need to paint some text and symbols on the piece as well as work out the center of it.

I've titled it Search For Your Invisible Heart.

I used a variety of different material in this one, layered plexiglass, steel, and found objects to my collages and my photography. A lot of cutting using the dremel and jigsaw. Cutting the plexiglass was pretty easy with the jigsaw once I discovered to secure a sheet of plywood under the plexiglass and a use a blade with a lot of teeth! my last attempt at cutting plexiglass on the table saw resulted in 20 stitches in my forearm when the plexiglass kicked back and gashed me! not good ( that was years ago).

I'm starting to figure out how to secure the different materials together, for instance glass and metal to wood then paper on top of it and clear acetate on top of that and making it look like they belong together.  

     

    I'm starting to figure out how to secure the different materials together, for instance glass and metal to wood then paper on top of it and clear acetate on top of that and making it look like they belong together.    

Earthbound Trancendentalist Assemblage

I believe I might be close to finished with this new assemblage that I've been working diligently on for the past two months. It's gargantuan compared to my other assemblages but I felt the need to break the habitual process, and for me at least, the repetitive nature of creating things that are only as big as my work table! This assemblage I tentatively titled Earthbound Transcendentalist and it's 3 feet tall and 2 feet wide and 7 inches wide. It's made up of from 80 separate objects that I've mined from various sources like swap meets and goodwill stores. This assemblage touches on the search for  transcendence beyond our physical reality. I incorporated representations of earthly life and aspects of the spiritual as guideposts towards another reality which that can be attained when one is contemplative and has a longing to find meaning in the suffering of everyday life. Thich Nhat Hanh wrote "We are here to awaken from the illusion of our separateness"

New assemblage and throwing some bowls

I've been working on this assemblage for  awhile now and I think its completed. I was thinking that I could embellish it more but I don't want it to be about excess or just going overboard for the sake of it, I believe in a bit of restraint,  I had to tell myself repeatedly to not go Baroque on it.
This assemblage touches on the subject of aging and coming to terms with it spiritually, physically and mentally. I'm over 50 years old and its a time as the noted Mythologist, Joseph Campbell, says "not of achievement but of realization"  A transition into assimilating the choices we've made, where we've been and where we are going.

I have also been fired up to throw clay again on the wheel and start altering the wheel thrown bowls. I watched a wonderful inspiring 30 minute documentary on Lee Kang Hyo, a potter from Korea https://youtu.be/ayDjp4yvF3o?list=PLw5HG1BBLUD-0xdwZYaXb0xV6Qt7PQzcQ
I'm rusty, but I am going to persist, be in the moment and I hope to make a few good bowls in the future!

3 new assemblage sculptures

                              I've been busy completing the detail work on two of these assemblages and the nutshell one came together pretty quickly! The one titled Hollow Hills has been a work in progress for about 9 months! Exploring different variations and trying to finish up the details which seem to take the longest! I'm not a fan of spelling out what specifically these works are about, but it's the usual themes I like to explore, life, death, spirituality, Buddhism.       

                                           Shadow play   
Height 23" x  Length 16" x Width 3" constructed with two boxes, glass, part of a trophy, old embossed newspaper, a fishing lure, string, a ceramic hand, collage, lettering, paint and put together with wood screws, bolts and gorilla glue.

                                                                     In a nutshell
Height 17" x Length 8" x Width 8 1/2" when its opened the length dimensions are 8" longer
constructed with an wooden nut that used to hold cutlery, resin casted birds, clock parts, earing, two lenses, metal cut from a cookie tray, cut up candy dish, water colors and acrylic for the painting designs and black matt paint for the exterior and held together with wood screws and gorilla glue.

                                             Hollow Hills
Height 36" x Length 17" x 5 1/2 " Constructed from part of an old cabinet, the body of a clock which need major reconstruction, brass chandelier arms, drink coasters, glass hands, rusted wolf, plastic bird painted gold,  a collage with some of my writing, small ravens mounted on wire, I painted the body black and gold leafed a detail on the front door. Put together with plenty of nails, screws glue.

Assemblage

This is a new assemblage jewelry box I made this week. Parts are from an old desk lamp, pocket watch, watch parts, beads, various nick nacks in the drawers.

FRONT

                                                                    
                                                                           
                                                                            BACK

OPENED

Assemblage

I've been working on these assemblages the past few weeks and are still works in progress.
The materials used are things I've found the past few years, they include moss, wood, chandelier parts, glass, photographs, plexi glass, salt and pepper shakers paper, beads, metal, clock parts. A lot of grief trying to bring the disparate objects together and connect them..no single adhesive can be used for everything! I utlized wood screws, metal bolts,wood glue, and glue of epoxy.

This assemblage utilizes 18 seperate objects to get to this stage of construction. I had to reassemble the clock body and repaint it, it was basically in pieces when I bought at the swap meet for $5.00. The rectangular display case was also a swap meet find and dissasembled, I rebuilt it, painted it and added gold leaf. I then secured the clock body and display case together with wood screws and added the brass chandaleir arms with the plexi glass boxes. The metal apertures at each end are tin lids and camera lenses with small collages inside each.  Again, bringing together different materials like metal and plexi glass and expecting them to adhere together with one kind of adhesive does not work. I had to use wood screws, bolts, glue of epoxy and nails to bring all this together. This is still a work in progress. 

This assemblage is constructed with wood, glass, wood plugs that I've gold leafed, plexiglass boxes with collages inside each one, salt and pepper shakers and one of the three wise monkeys made of balsa wood, black letters of plastic that follow the gold leafed plugs on the exterior.  Another work in progress.