A hop, skip and jump - sand sculpture
Do you remember the motion trail effect in videos from the 70's. Children's TV shows seemed to be full of them and it really stuck with me. It was so cool to see the movement broken down into many still images. It was an education in movement and very trippy.
I have always want to try and create movement in my sculpture. If you follow my blog you may have seen one or two already. With this sculpture I was trying to develop the idea further but not very happy with the result.
The theme in Travenmunde, Germany for 2004 was the Olympics and I figured it would be an opportunity to try and add some movement to the static sculptures of sporting characters I was given to make, I was asked to make the long jump from three separate piles as a sequence. Of course I could have just gone for still sculptures of the most important moments but I hoped to do something a bit different.
Making a dynamic pose in sand is difficult because you can't undercut the sand too much or the piece will collapse.So, using other momentary images from the motion may help me to fill in the empty spaces. On paper it may have seemed like a good idea but sand isn't always the most cooperative of materials.
Each of the sculptures was broken into 5 frames from the movement. 5? well because it was not 4 or 6. 3 would have been silly, 2 would have been too little and 1 would have been right back to what I should have done in the first place. 7 would have been right out. So 5 was the number of my choosing (Python fans may get my reference)
Even though I think there was something to gain from my approach I still needed to add a support under the sculpture which really bothered me. I cut away as much sand as I could and left this element till the end trying to work out what to do with it. My solution wasn't great, I must admit. In hindsight I should have used the sodded grass they laid around the sculptures to make it disappear. Or perhaps, if I had made a rough texture on the bottom the contrast would have separated the sculptures from block enough to make them seem lighter.
From the waist up, I suppose there was something working but from there down the sculptures lost their way, as did I. Well there is nothing I can do now except learn from my mistakes. Anyway, Onward and upwards... or downwards, you can be the judge,
Ps
Thanks for reading. I use Steem to document my work as an ephemeral Sculptor of sand, snow and ice, among other things. This will hopefully give it a new life on the Steem blockchain. Below you will find some of my recent posts.
Earth worm (NSFW, may contain nuts) - sand sculpture
Welcoming Cyprus to the EU - sand sculpture
Frodo's Pepper Ghost - sand sculpture
I hope you'll join me again soon.
@ammonite
[//]:# (!steemitworldmap 53.958430 lat 10.885218 long A hop, skip and a jump - sand sculpture 2004 d3scr)
Wow . I’ve seen these in Las Palmas on Las canteens beach . Sand cities . How the hell do you do them . I would say it is very frustrating work but great at the end
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I think i may have been to that project once. I have to say it can be hard work with the digging of tonnes of sand and frustrating when things don't go as hoped but as a material it is very fast and much easier than chipping away at a piece of stone for months.
I really like these, @ammonite, ... you didn't quite feel pleased with them? i think these really capture the thoughts and concepts of frozen moments of motions :) very cool work <3 i love it !
Thank you. There were elements that i thought worked ok but overall the piece didn't sing for me. if that makes sense?
This is exactly why I love the internet in general and Steem in particular: It gives you the opportunity to discover and explore relatively unknown art forms such as sand sculpture and get an interesting story to go with it :) Beautiful work, @ammonite!
Thank you kindly for being the first to engage with my post. It's true that sand sculpture is relatively unknown. I think there are around 250 world wide who do it professionally but there are many more who do it as a hobby. It is quite accessible as a material and many people connect because it is one of the first sculpture materials people play with as a child.
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Hello @ammonite, thank you for sharing this creative work! We just stopped by to say that you've been upvoted by the @creativecrypto magazine. The Creative Crypto is all about art on the blockchain and learning from creatives like you. Looking forward to crossing paths again soon. Steem on!