06.10.19

As I received an email from Curatorspace.com that my proposal had been accepted on the morning of Thursday 26th Sept, it only gave me 9 days to get the sculpture made and dropped off to their storage site on Friday 4th Oct. So after my lectures on the Thursday morning, I went straight to the metal work room to speak to the technician and get some advice on the next steps for making. I then bought and cut to size the materials ready to start building the sculpture. 

I started with 2 31cm square sheets of 0.9mm Brass, which I then marked out and cut into circles. Filing the edges and using the process of annealing (blow torching the Brass to heat it, and dunking it into cold water) to help soften the metal, making it easier to hammer into shape. After hours of hammering and repeating the annealing process, I was happy with the shallow shape of the bowls; which would hold a pile of coins in one, and the tree in the other.

On the Friday morning I got back to the metal work room early and with the assistance of the technician Warren, cut the Steel poles to size. Using a 150cm long 2cm thickness Steel pole for the upright and 120cm long 1.5cm thickness for the horizontal. As we discussed different ways of securing the metal poles together and into one position such as creating a bracket, we then decided on drilling a hole through the upright pole at an angle, creating a very solid structure. Once I had decided the angle and marked it out, Warren drilled a hole the thickness of the horizontal pole. This worked extremely well, and reduced the amount of work needed to install on the day. The horizontal pole now just slides through the cut out, securing/clamping into place with a short screw. 

I then got 3 pieces of MDF board with a thickness of 18mm cut. 2 pieces at 50cm and one at 25cm. After adding glue and clamping into place, they will be ready and dry after the weekend.

In the afternoon of the Friday, I then had the task of sourcing elements such as metal gold chain and metal hoops to secure the Brass bowls to the poles, and metal primer and spray etc. 

On the Monday after having sourced everything else I needed to finish the structure, I returned to the work room to finish what I could. After drilling a 2cm hole through the wooden base and erecting the Steel structure, the scales were beginning to come together. As I had the metal chains for the Brass bowls, with the help of Warren I measured out 3 equal spots where the chains would be attached. After drilling the holes through the Brass bowls and through the horizontal Steel pole, I attached the metal chains and hoops to the structure. 

I was really excited to see my vision come together and was extremely happy with the results. I have never worked with metal before and have enjoyed how labour intensive and difficult the material has been.

As I returned to my lectures for the week, I made preparations for the weekend to come. I primed the wooden base with pva glue during the week to ensure that it would be weather and rain proofed, and early Thursday after a meeting, got the train home to London. 

After speaking further to the organisers and finding out more information about what they would like and what the set up would be, we decided that a black plinth would work well with the piece. So when I got home I went straight to B&Q to get some wood cut to make the plinth. As the scales would have one half hanging lower than the other, I had to work out what height the plinth could be, still allowing an easy view into the Brass bowl to see the coins. Deciding that a square plinth at 80cm x 80cm by 50cm in height would be perfect. I then picked up some oil base exterior paint in black, with a metal primer spray.

With the metal and wood primed and sprayed/ painted black, everything was going to plan. 

I then had the task of sourcing the tree for one half of the scales and had come across a tree that had fell down a couple roads away from my house. So I took a saw over there and cut off a couple sections with a strong and thick bottom branch. 

After deciding what branch worked best, using a Stanley blade I began to peel away some of the bark from the branch. This revealed a beautiful orange which reminded me of flesh tones, leaving cuts and scars on the branches skin surface.

Once I had removed some of the bark, I burnt the tree using our BBQ. This worked really well as I was able to rotate the branch and choose a particular area to burn. At first I was really disappointed as it seemed I wasn't achieving the charcoaled finish I was hoping for, but as I spent more time on it, realised the tree just wasn't getting hot enough. 

Once I had burnt the tree enough, I created a hole in the middle of the branch's bottom and a hole into the Brass bowl. Then using a long screw and a seal of metal adhesive, I secured the tree to the bowl. Using the same adhesive I glued a selection of foreign and English coins in a range of colours to the other Brass bowl. I tried to make the coins look as if they were just dropped into a pile, creating a natural looking overlapping composition. I am very happy with the final achieved look and couldn't wait to see it all pieced together.

As the forecast was looking like a lot of rain for the upcoming week of the protest, I had to come up of a way around the rain and not flooding the bowls. My way around this was drilling a couple of fine holes into the brass bowls to allow the rain water to drop through, hopefully not allowing the bowls to fill with water. 

It was now noon of Friday, the day I was supposed to drop the sculpture off to the Extinction Rebellion's storage and build address, but had a minor disaster of the paint on the plinth still being wet and in no sight of drying any time soon. After speaking to the site manager and asking if we can delay delivery until the Saturday, I had to quickly come up with a plan. I didn't want to risk the paint not being dry on the Saturday so decided to remake the plinth completely. After getting some more wood cut to the same sizes and purchasing a quick drying fence paint instead. The disaster seemed to be averted. 

After quickly making the polymer clay world sculpture topper and painting it black, all the separate elements were finally complete.

On Saturday morning I quickly mounted everything together and took some images to test what it looked like. I am very pleased with the outcome and think that it will work very well in the space and with the cause.