I’ve always been a fan of the Heavy Horse sculpture that stands on the West bound side of the motorway on the way out of Glasgow, it’s particularly impressive when illuminated on a clear night. There are a huge number of fantastic photo’s featuring the sculpture out there on the web although I particularly like this one from David May’s Flickr photostream:
I was certainly aware that Andy Scott has completed a number of other high profile sculptures, but to be honest I hadn’t actually seen other examples of his work until I started writing this article and conducting the obligatory google searches. One of the first sites I came across was Andy’s own website where you can download a number of pictures depicting his work, such as this fine example, ‘Arabesque’:
Andy has completed a number of fine sculptures but just to give you a sense of scale I thought I might share this image that happened across on Zimbio.com
According to Zimbio, this is the worlds largest example of a horse sculpture. It represents one of two heads Andy made, two Kelpies, which were subsequently placed at the entrance to the Forth and Clyde Canal.
It seems like forever and a day since I originally thought about giving my bonnie birds wings, indeed, it seems like forever and a day since I actually started making this one! Based around the same principles as it’s forebears I had to add some additional armature to build the wings both from a practical point of view but also to ensure that they would be strong enough to stand-up to life’s little knocks. This is the end result
I’m reasonably pleased with the finished product although, contrary to what it looks like, I had an abstraction of a Green Finch in mind when I painted it!
You would think that given, aside from chaffinches, that this is the only bird that visits our garden with any regularity that I’d be able to summon up an image in my minds eye and work it up on one of my bonnie birds; it seems my mind is prone to wandering when I pick up a paintbrush and the notion that I might paint anything in the fashion that I originally intended is completely lost!!
It seems that the higher the temperatures get with the incredible – if not late – onset of spring and summer the lower my enthusiasm for doing crafts becomes. Given the choice of doing ‘work’ in the garden or sitting doing crafts it seems that the garden chores win out every-time … not that there isn’t plenty to be getting on with out there!
I’ve not been completely idle though on the craft front with a couple of developmental pieces underway. This one was just done for fun when I was messing about with some left over mache.
The spider in the foreground here was my first, half-hearted attempt at a spider, partially inspired by some fabric spiders I caught a glimpse of on Ann Wood’s blog that Jolene follows, clearly it bears no real resemblance to that spider – it really just provided the kernel of a notion that later developed (and is developing) into an idea.
Following the creation of this rather cartoon-like spider I went on to work on something a bit more life-like with reference to a variety of spider photo’s and biology models that I found around and about on the internet. The end result was this spider pictured below.
I’m still not entirely satisfied with the spider – although I do like the mandible’s – I think the Abdomen (back bit) is too small in relation to the Cephalothorax (front bit). I may work up another version of this, weather permitting, that’s a bit more anatomically correct – although I don’t think I’ve ever made anything that’s not largely abstract … it might be an interesting challenge.
I’ve nearly finished working on a winged version of my bonnie birds, another development piece, and I’ll share that when it’s finished too.
I’ve put in place a self-imposed ban on making these sprites as they seem to be quickly taking over the house! Until I start making more again I’m just going to drip feed the existing ones to you!
Following Jolene’s last post I couldn’t resist the post title, nor – I’m afraid – could I resist including a little musical flashback to my youth … I’ll leave that till the end though!
As Jolene said in her post I have been making more bonnie birds and taking her through the process at the same time, I could be wrong, but I think it falls into the harder than it looks category. Certainly I think it’s taken a bit of practice and development to get them to the stage they’re at now, I only wish I had saved the original prototypes to share with you by way of a comparison with the ones I’m making now … the difference is quite startling!
I’m working on something else now and have saved the prototype of that one so you can see that these things don’t simply materialise without any thought … although that’s often the way these things begin, with a random convergence of whimsical and divergent partial thoughts! Anyway these will be my last Bonnie Birds for a while so that I can concentrate on other things.
I have blogged about these before, so won’t bore you with the details again. I have been trying to get some decent individual shots of them though and having struggled with lighting and props I finally managed to get some pictures for the shop, I’m rather please with them so I thought I might as well share them.
Click to view full sized images, there will be more to follow as I upload them.
I’m not sure if this is an abstraction of the commoner garden blackbird or what happens when bonnie birds start listening to goth music!? Whatever it is I’m rather pleased with the colour combo, I may even go so far as to describe it as being a bit chic … but, to be honest, I’m not entirely sure what that means!
Anyway, the sun’s been out the last few days and so it would have been churlish to not get out there are get a couple of photo’s outside, just for a wee change from my usual white background.
As ever this is available in our shop, there are also some additional images there too :)
Having made a few batches of previous bonnie birds and developed a decorative pattern that I think works for them – see previous posts here – I’ve been keen to develop alternative patterns, something as it turns out is easier said than done.
Here are a few examples of what I’ve come up with thus far, the first is my favourite of the the three and the last (zig-zag) is based on a design suggested by our wee lad:
Maybe it’s been the first rays of spring-time sun but I was compelled to decorate the latest couple of Bonnie Birds in vibrant yellows and reds.
I decided to stick with the simple design for these birds although I’m mulling over a variety of options for future generations of the Bonnie Birds … actually I’d love to do a tartan one but haven’t been able to find any tartan paint I like yet!
This (below) is only the second bird to have the large peacock-esque tail, again I stuck with a relatively simple design that I think works quite well … although it played havoc with my eyes doing it!
Skot is another artist found through DeviantArt where he goes by the name Lord Hoki, living on Austrailia’s East Coast Skot works in a variety of media creating a range of drawn, painted and sculpted objects. Much of his DeviantArt account is taken up with his Hoki range of work such as those pictured below:
Above is just one of a wide range of character sketches featured in Skot’s DeviantArt account. Aside from the sketches there are also fully worked up paintings (see below) in what is probably best described as, full 21st century technicolour:
I really love the blending and highlighting used in this painting, the background providing a wonderful richly textured contrast with the smooth features of the the face itself. It could be that I’m attracted to these works thanks to the eyes – eyes being something of an obsession for me – and what eyes these are! I almost feel like I could fall into them, a real focal point of many of these Hoki works.
If you like these characters painted, then you may well like them painted on t-shirts (below), wear an original work on your chest … I’d pay for that!
It only seems right that the Hoki’s be brought to life in an altogether more 3-dimensional fashion, and so it is we discover Captain Hoki:
The Captain here is a sculpture in papier mache that really fits in with it’s 2-dimensional forebears, the nose and eyes being the main feature with colouring and details in keeping with the designs I’ve already featured here and the others in Skot’s gallery.
Given what’s gone before you may well be forgiven that Skot is something of a one trick pony, yet nothing could be further from the truth and so, before I finish this post I’d like to share a few of Skot’s other works with you.
A pencil sketch entitled “My Dad”, we presume it is … his … not mine!
A couple of bird boxes made from reclaimed and recycled materials … makes me think that the birds we get around where I am are a bit rubbish. Having said that the Buzzards, Grouse and Barn Owls are pretty cool … oh! and we don’t get deadly spiders, snakes or other nasties!!
As ever I can’t recommend enough that you check out this artists gallery which is available here.
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art, featured artist, figurative, sculpture | Alasdair | 
29 July, 2010 10:44 am | 
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