Sculpture and Poetry

Looking at the Moon papercut 12.5 x12.5 inches © Patrick Gracewood

the earth is round
yet we divide it into squares.

we live in square houses,
in square rooms,
eat from round bowls
and round plates
each at a square table.

at night, we lie
each in a square bed
beneath the round moon.

will we ever fit together?

my thoughts go around
my round head~
they fly in circles
before lying down
in straight lines
on a square of paper;

then, line after line of thought
circles out from the square
of paper,
concentric circles circling out,
the pebble of a thought
tossed into the pond
of the universe…

one night, i too will lie
down in a straight line,
merely a thought
among other thoughts,
not connected except by shape,`
not fitting the circle
of the earth.

i am a square, a square peg~
a block-head
with a round hole
in the bullseye of my heart
that nothing stops

and i lift my round eyes
to the great circle of the sky
in wonder.

poem by Roy Anthony Shabla 

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I've known Roy for years and created the paper cut after reading his poem. He said that the paper cut was exactly what the next section of the poem was about. 
For more of Roy's work click here .

Here's the second draft of the papercut. I wanted the focus to be on the figure, not the moon. I like the spinning stars more, but the horizontal waves kill the background.  Time for #3 paper cut.

Sculpture and Boris Artzybasheff #3

Detail of above two page spread.

Sculpture and Boris Artzybasheff #2

All artwork is by Boris Artzybasheff is from the book "Gay-neck the Story of a Pigeon" by Dhan Gopal Mukerji.

The grim reaper

A lot of war is going on in this little square:air battles, a tank, bombs, barbed wire front lines and ruined trees.

More in the next post.

Sculpture and Boris Artzybasheff

All artwork by Boris Artzybasheff

The title caught my eye, "Gay-Neck, the Story of a Pigeon."
How could I resist?

I confess that I haven't read Dhan Gopal Mukerji 's book, but I have devoured the black and white illustrations by Boris Artzybasheff. The book won the Newberry Award for children's literature in 1928. Both men lead pretty amazing lives, Gopal Mukerji came from an upper class Indian family and the other fled the Russian Revolution.

The artwork in Gay-neck looks like paper-cuts and is a wild blend of 1920's Deco and Indian patterning.

More work by Boris Artzybasheff in the next post.

Sculpture and the first paper based transistor

Sculptor Beatriz Cunha has posted on her blog news of the first paper based transistor.

Created by Portuguese scientists, the discovery opens the door for new disposable electronics devices, like paper displays, smart labels, smart packaging, bio-applications, RFID tags, among others.

Read the full story on Beatriz's site.

Sculpture and Winter Light

The winter sunlight is low in the sky, often flattening objects to black silhouettes. 

Those silhouettes cast long shadows that seem more vivid, more real than the objects themselves.

Even the shadows of a bridge seem more substantial than the bridge itself

Art is really about understanding how to use light and shadow to tell a story. Take a walk to see how the winter light changes familiar things........

Sculpture and Duncan McRoberts.

Here's the finished ceiling panel, designed by Duncan McRoberts, ready for molding. 
 In the center there is an example of runwork, which is plaster that's been shaped into a specific profile. I don't have any pictures of it installed.

Finally, a use for those saved scraps of rosewood!

I made these wooden tools specifically for this project. One end of each stick is used to create a clean beveled channel, the other end is a very shallow curve used for modeling. I cut and filed a tongue depressor (at the far left) to be a comb tool.

The metal spheres are standard pattern maker tools, the wooden ones are used in ceramics. I made the largest one with a knob and a dowel.

Here's a cast from the mold to show you how each detail of this work is shaped by a specific tool.

If you want to make work this tight, you never touch it directly. By only using selected tools you can maintain both exact measurements and uniformity of form and surface texture.