Blog Archive
Week Two
September 13, 2007
I was busy and didn't think to blog for a few days, and then I was out of town.
The fittings for the breathing apparatus arrived while I was gone. Finally I am
able to experiment with the patina again. I have had to postpone that till this
equipment arrived.
I've
had a request from a graduating class for a stainless steel peace pole with
their 200 or so names etched on it. So I did the artwork above to show one way
that might be done. Naturally, it wasn't the first idea I had, but when I made
artwork to show them the first idea, I didn't like the way it turned out. So I
created the above. Then half an hour later I had second thoughts about that one
and created this one:
September
14, 2007
At right is the original idea I had for their peace pole. I just needed a little
more time to work out the artwork. Their names are etched tightly everywhere
other than where the text is dropped out to leave the blank stainless steel
letters of the peace messages.
From a distance, the peace messages would be what was visible. Up close the names would be more visible.
Names are repeated more than once so that any that are
obscured by the peace messages will be unobstructed elsewhere else on the pole.
The text "Gift of the Class of 2009" might be included. And a few design
elements might be be included, like a clear border at the edge of each face and
a couple of horizontal lines. It also might be good to capitalize all the
letters of the names in order to create straight edges without cutting off
ascenders and descenders, like the picture at this link:
http://www.peace-pole.com/images/blog.names.caps.jpg
It will take some experimenting to make sure I can make it appear the same way on the stainless steel.
If they decide to do this, it will be a mountain of engraving work. But it has given me an idea for another peace pole. What if a peace pole were made in this same way, but, instead of names engraved in the background, dozens of translations of the peace message were the small black type?
September 15, 2007
I invested soooooo much time in working out the details of this stainless and
copper peace pole and then making this prototype. Now that it is done, I have a
better idea. On one level, art is an on-going research and development project.
Fortunately, it does produce learning. I will use the design for this cap on a
peace pole that borrows a couple of ideas from this one, but that I think will
be better. Below is what it looked like when it was under construction.
September 16, 2007
Today
I worked on three wooden peace poles. I stopped making wooden ones myself, but
my brother decided he would like to take on a few. I put the finish on three of
them today. They are four-sided cedar poles eight feet tall with eight
translations carved into each of them.
I also worked on designing the top of the three-sided stainless peace pole.
September 17, 2007
Continuing work on the idea of dropping out the text of a large translation on a
bed of smaller translations has led to putting a border around the characters to
get an alphabet like Chinese to stand out. The big, block letters of our Roman
alphabet (A,B,C,D, etc.) stand out more, but
that always is the case, even with carving and other forms of representing
characters like Chinese. Chinese simply is a more delicate alphabet. Although,
with some more work, I might be able to get it to stand out a bit more.
Today I also am continuing work on the top of the three-sided peace pole.
September 18, 2007
The tool purchased on eBay has arrived. It will be days before I figure out if
it works. The amount of assembly and documentation and instructional DVDs and
the time needed to practice with it will consume part of my time everyday for weeks.
Meanwhile, I am making a crate to ship a pole, cutting metal for another pole,
etc. And received this email today:
Joel -
I wanted to let you know that we received our peace pole from you and
absolutely love it. People are referring to it as a true piece of art.
We "planted" it on 9-11 and received wonderful feedback.
Thank you for sharing your artistic talents with us.
Tracey
Century College
White Bear Lake, MN 55110
That's one of the reasons I spend so much time sketching and designing and thinking about what peace should look like.
September
20, 2007
Cutting, grinding and welding stainless steel are part of what's on the list
today. I made a plywood facsimile and left it standing where I would see it as I
worked on other things for a couple of days before committing the next stage of
this design to steel. It's only a prototype that I'm making, but stainless steel
is so expensive.
I'm trying to create a design that is simple, frugal and direct.