The Sculptor's Stand

[ArtsyLynda]

Yeah, some folks do wait until the next year to order something expensive they've seen in my booth, but sometimes they order it after they get home, or for a holiday gift. Or not at all. :P I just hope for the best and go on about my business . . .

No work on Levade for a while - gotta go see my life-size INSTALLED this week!!! HUZZAH!!

[ArtsyLynda]

I'm sure glad I decided to create trophies as part of my sculpting biz. Just got orders for 3 trophies, not expensive ones but everything helps! And I meet the nicest people when I get calls from folks ordering trophies. One of my orders is from a lady in Wellington FL where my daughter took her and several clients' horses for Jan-Feb this year and will do it again next winter. My new customer is looking forward to running into my daughter down there and possibly meeting me when we go down to visit our daughter (and the sun!!) probably in February next year. This lady and I chatted about all kinds of things for quite a while and could've talked longer if I weren't trying to be considerate of her phone bill! Such a nice way to start the day!

Gotta get out to the studio and get more work done on the relief and 3-D piece I'm working on . . . pics are on FB. I'll post them here soon.

[sculpturedolls]

Great that you got more orders for trophies. Every bit helps so that you can keep creating new sculptures.

Hmmm.... somehow I missed seeing the pics you had on facebook. Didn't show up on my newsfeed. I'll have to go to your page and see.

Been super busy working on waxes or I'd maybe have something new to write about a new sculpt, but don't have anything new or interesting at the moment.

Hope all are sculpting away.....

[ArtsyLynda]

I can post them here so you don't have to go looking. Hmm, maybe I should start a new thread? Okay, I'll do that, but here are the pics for now.

"Levade" is the piece I started while sitting in my booth at Equine Affaire. He'll be a very small bronze.



A levade is one of the hardest maneuvers for a horse to do, part of the "haute ecole" ("high school") riding like they do at the Spanish Riding School in Vienna Austria. It requires the horse to hold his body at a 45 degree angle for a while - that's why he has such big abs, from doing upper level dressage work and this kind of stuff, which depends on super-strong abs.

This relief (following) is of a horse I saw on Facebook. She belongs to a FB friend of mine in Australia. When I saw it, I was really taken with the mare herself and with the photo. Doing a relief at this angle is REALLY HARD!!!! but I''m learning a lot from it.



She still has a long way to go too (just like "Levade")

Copying this to a new thread.

[ArtsyLynda]

I'm still fighting with that relief - off and on. It's a ridiculously difficult angle for me for some reason. I'm happy with the body, but the angle of the head still isn't right. ARGH!!!

In other news - I saw this on LinkedIn and thought y'all might enjoy seeing it: http://www.kew.org/visit-kew-gardens/whats-on/david-nash/index.htm?utm_source=shorturl

Let's get these boards active again! Today my "artwork" has consisted of cleaning the granite dust off of everything in my kitchen and family room since John had to trim the counter a bit to make room for the new range. I have been too busy to start the piece I wrote about in "Inspiration" and still havent' finished the levade piece or the relief. Life's just been too busy lately!

In other news, my lifesize will be dedicated next week! HUZZAH! THEN I can show pics of him! And if you see the July issue of SW Art, he's advertised in there. Page 126, IIRC.

[sculpturedolls]

Congrats Lynda! I will look for your advertisement in Southwest Art July issue when I get mine in the mail. How very exciting to have that magnificent horse sculpture with an unveiling and dedication ceremony. Are you going to be there for the ceremony and give a speech?

As for my art, I'm working on a mold of my small lady on the chaise lounge and half way done with it. In between that, I'm working on a sculpture of a lady sitting in her garden daydreaming. I will go make a mold of her soon and go into bronze. My pregnancy sculpture had such a good reception at my local town's artist reception that I'm going to mold it and go into bronze with it too. Also, I've been told by our local art's commission that they want me to do a lifesize children sculpture in bronze for our city.

That's what I've been up to. How about anyone else out there? What projects are you working on?

[ArtsyLynda]

A SPEECH?!? :O Nobody said anything about that!!! I doubt that will be expected but if I HAVE to, I can probably manage something not totally incoherent!!! And yes, I will be there!

The lifesize commission sounds wonderful!!! Congrats! And kudos on all your other good news too! Sounds like that show opened some interesting doors for you!

[sculpturedolls]

Well everyone knows the artist is supposed to say a few words, ha, ha, ha, ha! Just kidding, if they haven't told you anything about it as yet then you're probably off the hook. Look forward to all pics.

Yes, the benefits of my art show are extending past the the show itself. You know how people say that artist need to get out and mingle and do shows, it really is true even if we want to be introverts in our little world of art making.

[ArtsyLynda]

I wish there were more such opportunities for me here. And the shows I've had work in in KY, I haven't been able to make it to the openings! Grrr. There's another this fall. Hopefully I can make it to that one. It will be full of equine art collectors, so maybe I'll get some opportunities there.

[ArtsyLynda]

Hmm, we've allowed this threat do languish TOO LONG!! Let's see, catching up . . . I still having finished "Levade" - gee, in the course of moving, I'd actually forgotten about him. I started a new piece that's a commission (another Friesian) but it's packed up along with the other WiPs since my studio still isn't set up completely. The pony relief is finished and cast - I call it "Enchanting" because the mare's name is "Voodoo Doll" and that doesn't have the best connotations to me. Plus, I rarely give sculptures the name of the actual horse being portrayed.

I had the pony cast in resin and had them prepared for painting - only one is painted (by the caster, who's an excellent painter) to show how it can be finished. They're drilled with a keyhole in the back so they can be hung directly on the wall. I'm going to try to sell them to people to finish themselves. I keep having people wanting to "finish" my cold-cast porcelains (I HAVE refused to sell them to people who want to paint them!), so I thought I'd make something they COULD paint! I'm hoping they'll sell well since they'll be "relatively" inexpensive compared to most of my stuff.

As you can see from my other thread, I'm trying to get better at working in water-based clay and at figurative work. If I can manage to get good enough at it and ENJOY it, I may buy a kiln this year, since I had a big sale and will have money to "burn" before the IRS gets hold of it!! I'm going to be taking a lot of workshops too.

I planned to buy the anatomical study models from Anatomy Tools as one of the ways to spend some of my money, but John saw me looking at them and said he wanted to buy at least one for me as a birthday present - my birthday's Thursday and he hasn't even thought of what to get me yet - so I gave him the link and let him buy what he wants (they're having a sale through the end of January, so he's lucky there!).

I want to take some workshops in NON-equine art to push me creatively, and I've found some that interest me, but then the American Academy of Equine Art sent out their workshop list for this year and I've picked equine workshops that are too close to the non-equine ones I was looking at. Oh well. I'll figure something out.

I also want to take some figurative workshops - gotta see how my schedule looks after signing up for the equine ones. I want to show my horse this year and can't afford to be gone TOO much!

And that's me catching you up for now. Next!!

[ArtsyLynda]

SD, I'm SO EXCITED!!! I got into one of Phillipe Faraut's workshops! I'm taking a 5 day one (can't see going that far - to NY state - for a 3 day, sorry - I want the whole nine yards!!) in June. A lot of his classes are sold out already. I"ve also signed up for two American Academy of Equine Art workshops, one a 5 day one in Aiken SC with someone who casts in bronze, fine porcelain and resin and who sculpts in Apoxie Sculpt, plastilene, water-based clay and Super Sculpey. I want to learn how to use Apoxie Sculpt and she does a lot more detailed work than I do, so I want to pick up some new techniques from her. The other is a sculpture/jewelry workshop in KY with Lisa Perry - she's an amazing sculptor and does gorgeous jewelry too. I need some help with my wax work for jewelry, so I'm hoping to concentrate on that in her class. So there goes a wad of my money I had to spend! I'll fly to NY and SC and drive to KY and stay in NICE hotels at each one to use up some of that money I need to do something with before the IRS takes too big a chunk of it from me!! I'm still looking into creative workshops - glass (kiln fired, etc.), I dunno what else. This will be a big learning year for me! Yay! I'm SO excited about these workshops!!

[sculpturedolls]

Just saw your post! Wow! You are going to learn so much I'm so excited for you and can't wait to hear all about it. Glad you got that extra mula to spend on these classes and might as well stay at nice hotels while you're at it. your husband's going to like this as I'm sure he's going to, right?

[ArtsyLynda]

Dunno if he's going or not, but *I* will certainly enjoy the amenities! If he comes, he will too. It would mean a week off work for him, and I have two other workshops I'm taking before June (one in March - equine art - one in May - equine jewelry) - he doesn't usually go with me unless he has business he can conduct nearby so he won't get bored. And yeah, I'm excited! Have you seen the finger tools Faraut offers? Since I do have mulah this year, I ordered those and one of his wooden tools that's different than the ones I have (it has a much flatter head than mine do - I tend to nearly always buy spoon-shaped tools because I prefer them, but he said this was the tool he uses most, so I figured if I'm gonna learn from him, I may as well use his tools). They aren't here yet, but will be here before my next class. I'll try them on my sculpt next week.

I started working on the eyes on my lady last night just a little and someone asked me if I could teach her how to do eyes. Well, sure! She makes animals, not people, and I'm good at animal eyes! I'm not too bad at people eyes either, they just take me longer because I don't do them as often. It will be fun to teach her. I'm enjoying my class even if they do completely different stuff - we're all becoming friends now, and that's fun, especially since we don't know very many folks in this area yet.

[sculpturedolls]

Just checked out Faraut's finger tools. Those look like good tools to have. I don't recall seeing them when I bought some of his other tools in the past. Thanks for mentioning them.

Well, if you go by yourself, then you'll have time to focus a lot just on the class. You are going to learn so much!

Hey, I just got a bid from your foundry and am thinking of trying him out on my new sculpture. Do you think the foundry is good at doing detail works like mine? Spoke with the owner and he sounded nice to work with. Which airport do you fly out to when you go there? Motel? We probably would just make the 11 hour drive but if the airport was close, maybe we'd do that, don't know for sure. Excited to see what kind of work he can do with my sculpts.

[sculpturedolls]

Just ordered the finger tools set! Curved metal tools can't be found just any place!