The local tree cutting service wanted a wall hanging sculpture for their office to celebrate a company anniversary. My client (AquaCut), contacted me and asked me to create the art for something different and relevant to the company. They gave me creative freedom, but wanted final approval on sketches before I began creating the art in Illustrator. After days of sketching, we settled on one idea and I began refining the concept into a multi-layered, dimensional piece of art. The tree alone is five layers in Illustrator, plus additional layers for the tree climber and the logo that appears in the heart of the tree.
Then came the unusual request from the client. They didn't have time to create the sculpture and asked me to build it and
use their facilities and that they would provide any assistance and equipment that I required. Of course I jumped at the opportunity because as a designer, you don't always get to work with your hands. In creating this piece, I either used a metal
roller or hand curved 1/16" stainless steel using any and every surface in the shop to obtain the curves and feel that I was
looking for in order to a flowing, wavy motion. The piece looked a little flat, so I started noodling with a Drimmel to get some
sort of texture to bring some warmth to the bark. After using a diamond bit for hours, I can tell you, my hands were aching,
but the results were worth the cramps...
For the wood frame, the client provided "mushroom" wood. Mushroom board is one of the newest reclaimed wood varieties on the market. Mushroom board is used in commercial mushroom growing. Mushrooms grow well on softwoods like hemlock, cypress and cedar. These boards are great for growing mushrooms because they can withstand the deterioration from soil and moisture. This wood deteriorates beautifully, but I wasn't happy when we layered the mockup in order to get a feel for the final art. The client and I were brainstorming for a solution then I had a thought, "What if we burn it?" The client grinned and said, I've got a blowtorch. So, there I am toasting wood on a concrete slab in 90 degrees of cloudless sky. Think I got toasted, too. But, the results were worth all the effort as the torch added an extra layer of contrast and dimension.
Always embrace the unexpected when creating anything. In this case, we cut out the logo and just needed to pop the leaves out. For some reason I started to bend them, but not remove them entirely from the template and I then had the "aha" moment. It looked better with the leaves creating dimension and complemented the rest of the sculpture.
For this piece, AquaCut had a client who needed a peacock design for a forged driveway gate. I initially started designing the entire gate, but the client just wanted a peacock.
Part of my peacock explorations.
We settled on a design and I began sequencing the drawing layers.
This is a colored Illustrator version of the final artwork with all the layers.
The final piece is 12 layers of brass and Cor-Ten steel, which begins to rust upon exposure to the elements. The peacock alone weighs about 200 pounds.
Here is an photo of the gate being assembled. I designed the peacock to it can be on each side of the gate when opened.
And voila! The final gate installed and you can see how the Cor-Ten has already begun the rust process.
AquaCut requested a design for a charity auction and I came up with this concept of a mirror.
