Thursday 30 January 2014

Sculpture in Portland Stone; Barry the Beak

I am in the process of completing my second sculpture in Portland stone

this piece is inspired by the themes "dark matter"and "gargoyles"
These are both themes I've been using in my work for Trinity Catholic school, Lspa and The Chelmsley Wood stone carvers,at the Baptist church, Chelmsley Wood, Birmingham

 not quiet finished, but I think I'm close to a final form

I started this piece with something very different in mind

the original piece of stone was very long and thin 

my idea was to start with a dragon head similar to "Gorgeous George"(see my post Gargoyles and others, 28/11/13) with a figure holding /appearing from its mouth

But the stone is not the best quality and too narrow, gradually I removed the figure and the front of dragons mouth.
Sometimes I find you have to let go of an original idea to allow the work to fully develop. This process usually starts by a bit dropping off unexpectedly, then quite a lot of swearing.