Antarctic ocean - ice sculpture

Remember that movie, ' Driving miss penguin'? it really helped popularise the plight of these bowling skittles with beaks. How their little brains are wired to live in the most inhospitable place on earth I will never know but it was great to hear the silky smooth voice of Morgan Freeman try and explain.
These little critters are fun to carve because with minimum body parts they can still be quite expressive and sure who doesn't love Spheniscidae.

2007 An Antarctic odyssey

Another year and another project, 2007 opened with a new ice project in Oviedo, Spain. To be honest it didn't feel like Spain because it was at a big generic shopping center on the outskirts of the town where they had build a big temporary warehouse freezer and we didn't have to go to far to our hotel. Also our tough work hours wasn't leaving us with much energy in the evenings to explore.

With a theme of 'The world' there was pretty much just bits and pieces of famous buildings and landscape divided into continents. First I was sent to Antarctica to create the entrance to the exhibition along with Ludo Roders a long time friend from Holland.
Moran Freeman informed us that there isn't much on that frozen landmass except for snow, ice and penguins. So that would be what we focused on. Our ice was stacked in such a way as to create a tunnel into the project where the traveler would be surrounded in Ice. Even though ice is pretty strong having several tonnes of it above your head can be quite intimidating. As a staking it seemed unfinished and I think they actually ran out of ice.

The funny thing about ice is that it really doesn't look like ice

It reminds me more of a big box of space. These ice blocks are man made and are usually perfectly clear with not a bubble inside to give you reference. All you can really focus on is the surface and edges. We wanted to make it look like ice but it resembled more water and as you walked through the tunnel it gave a feeling of being under the ocean.

Our first decision was to give this ocean a surface of frozen ice to make it feel more claustrophobic. We cut sheets of snow that we found from other sculptors and broke them into pieces. These were laid all over the top surface and when looked at from below gave a great impression that you were under a frozen ocean. (before anyone points it out I know that there is land under Antarctica but this scene is from the edge so nah nah nah nah nah!)

The holey area

There was a gap in the roof where they had no ice bridging the gap. For us that was a perfect little area where the audience could come up for air and we lined around it with more snow to make a nicer frame than the square blocks of ice.
It was interesting the way it made you feel as you walked through and came to this area, you really had a moment where you felt free for a moment and could take a breath. It was also a perfect place for some penguins.

Looking down at you as you passed by. It really created a nice perspective and made you feel like you were part of the sculpture. Although nobody ever saw this top view of the sculpture I thought it looked pretty cool.

Going swimmingly

The walls of ice (or should I say water) around the tunnel were carved with a gouge to give a ripple effect as the light played on it. Then Ludo and I carved negative penguins on the outsides of the walls. They really appeared to be swimming all around you. The ripples made them seem to be moving as you walked by as little air bubbles floated to the surface.

Testing testing

I tried an experiment of having one of the swimmers going from positive to negative carving as if he had just jumped down from above and was breaking through the water. I am not sure if it had the desired effect but it certainly got me interested in developing this technique further but that's for another day.

We had lot's of fun making this piece. It was more of an installation than a sculpture (That's what the art world calls this kind of stuff). I really wish that I could have seen it through the eyes of someone who was seeing it for the first time. The other sculptors working onsite liked it but they also say it being created so I never got anyone's first impressions of the piece.
I have to say that all these years later and looking at the photos I am pretty impressed with what ludo and myself pulled off with what we were given. I think even Morgan would of approved.

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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.

A modern nativity - sand sculpture

Sid's adventure - ice sculpture

Ice Age 2 - ice sculpture

I hope you'll join me again soon
@ammonite
[//]:# (!steemitworldmap 43.389750 lat -5.805743 long Antarctic ocean - ice sculpture 2007 d3scr)