Alice In Wonderland Sculpture

Patina is the color put on metal through the introduction of chemical and heat. This is a massive sculpture to patina and will take a team of qualified foundry workers days . The sculpture will be a traditional bronze patina.  The foundry has made me some sample plates while I was visiting.  I have a variety of different texture and am known for my textures. Varied texture helps give a greater variation within a small color pallet. The key will be:
1. To work with color and the texture to make the sculpture pop.
2. To make color cohesiveness between the pieces.
3. To help bring the eye through the entire 24 foot sculpture with the use of the pieces themselves, negative space , and color.

This is VERY hard to do when I’m not there watching. Here is the beginning of notes to the foundry. We will work closely with each other to be sure everything is just right.

They have to work hard and fast as humidity and temperature will have an affect on the metal.

 

I stood in the Alice chair once before. I know the park will most likely have a sign that says do not climb, but I could not help myself.

A metal check is when an artist comes into the foundry and looks over the entire sculpture very carefully. You will see as you follow this blog that the sculpture has gone through many steps in its creation. The artwork had an added distraction in that the artist had to move the artwork from one foundry to another mid-project. No one knows the sculpture like the artist. With so many hands involved in creating the art in bronze, combined with 150 hidden things in the sculpture, there is a great chance that something might be wiped out somewhere along the process.

It took a long time to approve all the metal. Deep in the Heart was very gracious with their time and expertise, especially since they had to fix mistakes made by another foundry. For example, the Mad Hatter was tipped so far over it looked like he was falling and not pouring tea. His chair was attached to him in a way that was counterproductive to the flow of the design. This was very difficult because inside all of the pieces there are structural elements and with the Hatter and his chair and him tipping, those structural elements are of utmost importance.  The foundry cut off the chair and repositioned the Hatter. Once everything was as the artist intended it you could hear others in the room in agreement that this was the way it was supposed to be. It just works and flows so much better.  Deep In the Heart went above and beyond and helped to figure out the best way to fix what could have been a very costly problem.

I went to the foundry to check the metal. It was a very long day. It took me about 7 or 8 hours plus the 2 1/2 hour drive there and 2 1/2 hour back. I asked my friend Johnny Rojas to make a video of me seeing the sculpture for the first time.  He went in before me and then shot my expression as I had seen the sculpture. Remember I have been working on this for nearly six years from concept to installation.