Honor the Earth

Protect the Soil

Here is a story

of the creation

of a bronze

sculpture

sculpted by Lynette

Power

Credits and Thanks Inspired by Vic Ormsby, who deeply understood the

dynamic connection between the food we eat and the soil

beneath our feet.

The purpose of the sculpture is to honor the earth and all

those who understand the delicate and fragile nature of

the earth's ecosystem and work to protect it.

This project is made possible by the generosity of

the McKnight Foundation through a grant from the

Southeastern Minnesota Arts Council.

• To have public art which reminds citizens of the need to

be good stewards of the land so that it is viable for

sustaining future generations.

• To educate the public about the urgent need for

protecting the basic elements to life on Earth; soil, water

and the air we breath.

• To enhance our community with art which is available for

all people to enjoy every day.

Materializing a sculpture - the

process1. Grab onto one of the ideas that inspires you and make the decision to act.

2. Make an armature.

3. Create the clay original on the armature.

4. Make a mold of the original.

5. Pour a wax copy in the mold.

6. Make a refractory mold of the wax.

7. Burn out - melt the wax out of the mold.

8. Pour molten bronze into the hot empty mold.

9. Chip the mold off the cooled bronze and sandblast clean.

10. Fix casting flaws and weld pieces together.

11. Retexture and sandblast for final surface.

12. Patina

13. Install

I will show you some of these steps in the making of

“Honor the Earth”

Wire armature is constructed

1/4th inch aluminum wire is formed into a stick-man and put it into the position of the figure. .

Developing profiles in oil base

clay• The first step in the application of the

clay is to create a thin pancake like

profile of the figure on the wire

armature. This flattening of the forms

helps us to see the shapes and

proportions.

• As the sculpture turns there is a new

profile for every degree of the turn.

These shapes copy what we see of

the model. If we continue to sculpt

from the profiles, we eventually get a

very good likeness to our model

• Since every degree of tilt will also give

new profiles, the number of profiles is

infinite. To simplify, the next profile will

be made at a right angle to the first,

watching the model for the shape and

proportion.

Developing the forms and building volumes

The second

pancake profile

which is 90 degrees

is sculpted from the

strait on view from

the front and back.

Begin filling in the

volumes between

the pancakes, using

the model as the

guide.

The model for the sculptureMany of you will recognize Steve

Kukowski. He generously gave his

time modeling for this project.

Modeling is a very

difficult job. Muscles

tire quickly from

holding limbs in

unsupported positions.

Frequent breaks are

necessary.

Hand and garlic details

Finishing details and lettering the

base

The lettering read, Protect the Soil,

Honor the Earth, our source of life.

The moldIn early January of

2010 I took the clay

sculpture to the foundry

and they made a mold

on it and poured a wax

copy in the mold

A wax copy was made and

painted with a bronze colored

paint.

This wax copy was

shown at the Frozen

River Film Festival in

2010 in memory of

Vic. The festival

theme for that year

was food.

This completed

the first phase of

the project in 2010

The project awaiting funding

September 2013

McKnight Grant through

Southeast Minnesota Arts

Council

Phase 2 of the Sculpture

The bronze colored paint on the

wax display made it unusable for

foundry and casting purposes so

that was recycled into the wax pot

and a new copy was made. There

were 7 parts to the mold and at

least one wax copy was made of

each part.

Since the base had a problematic warp in the

mold,

I decided to resculpt it. I realized that if I made it a

little deeper I could depict soil strata on the sides

of the base to clarify the intention of the sculpture.

To further represent Vic, I added garlic,

which was one of his passions. I also

included many other things to symbolize life

in the soil.

Below is the mold for the new base during the

wax pouring process. The wax is the green.

The yellow is the rubber part of the mold,

which will capture the details. The white is the

plaster part of the mold, which holds the

rubber in shape.

Parts were not fitting together

In the 4 years that the

molds have been sitting,

there has been a lot of

distortion. There were

some places which needed

up to an inch of tweaking

to get them together.

In addition to warping, I

could see major

corrections in the

sculpture itself that

needed to be made.

Trying to fix the face

I thought the face was too cartoony because the eyes were too big, but would I wreck it if I tried to change it?

Beyond hope. Back to the

primordial soup

Looking for the perfect smile

Of the hundreds of faces that I looked

at on Google search this guy hit the

bulls eye.

Talking with my son who was visiting for

Christmas, I realized why I thought that smile

was such a winner and Luke graciously

consented to let me photograph him so that I

could get the other dimensions.

Two wax heads are better than

one.

Starting over

Wax is a really tough medium to

sculpt because it has to be

heated before it will begin to

move at all.

In the picture below, it was getting

close, with only 14 areas to fix. I

needed to get this to the foundry on

Christmas eve day.

Less than 24

hours before it

went to the

foundry

After many sleepless nights,

the last sculpting details were

worked out and we loaded it

up for the foundry trip.

Nothing like a deadline.

It will take the foundry at least

a month, and I needed it by

January 24th for the Frozen

River Film Festival.

Progress pictures from the foundry

Do you recognize the handsome guy?

More details to come. I will

pick up the sculpture next

week and bring you up to

date on the patina process.

Frozen River Film

Festival 2014

Please visit our

display

Sunday, January 26th

at the