Not True Wealth - Sand Sculpture
This sculpture is made from beach sand which is not usually the best for making complex pieces. I usually like working with glacial or river bed sand as it has sharper edges and silt which help the grains lock together better.
I wanted to do a piece about our quest for money and all the things it can't buy. These thing can't be gotten through wealth which makes money not true wealth. (See what I did there) These are the things which are actually the most important thing in life.
The location was Fulong, Taiwan and it was part of a large project with around 30 carvers from all round the world. This was my piece for a competition run during my time there.
I always imagined that Taiwan would have nice weather but unfortunately it rained nearly constantly and that coupled with the weak beach sand lead to some major collapses of the sculpture just before judging took place in the competition. I was able to get some picture before this happened. Maybe I will make a post of my best collapses some day.
The piece showed a big pile of money with four abstracted figures each depicting the different things that money just cant buy.
Happiness
I made a guy on top resting his head in defeat after discovering that the money he accumulated didn't bring him joy.
Loneliness
On one of the sides was a naked guy and with his back turned to the audience trying to find comfort in his money. Not letting anyone else in. Unfortunately I had a bad collapse with him but tried to salvage what i could by creating a negative impression of him in the wades of notes. I some ways it may have added something to the piece.
Love
My favorite figure was of man holding a rose with no one to give it to.
Life
And, finally was a figure which was melting back into the earth, dust to dust. No matter how much money you have you can't bring it with you and we only have a finite time in this world.
Sorry to leave this on such a downer note but working on this piece I did have alot of time to ponder the big picture and think about what is actually important to me in my life. Family, friends, health and happiness.
PS.
I hope you enjoyed this post. I am still getting the hang of Steemit and trying to work out the best formatting and writing approach for building this, what I would like to be my portfolio/book. As you can probably understand words aren't exactly my strong point so, any advice or criticisms welcome and again thanks for joining me.
@ammonite
Introduction post
https://steemit.com/introduceyourself/@ammonite/introducing-daniel-doyle-sculptor-and-film-maker
Great job!
All the money turning to dust would be a very appropriate backdrop for many scenes in recent years. I would love to see those pictures too.
And we can be sure that it will happen again real soon. We have learned nothing from the recession.
Incredible sculptures, very cool!
Thank you @rarepepe. Nice name by the way.
For this kind of content I think your writing style is fine. Very straight forward, like a curator of art should be. Once again loving your work here.
I'd actually love a hollowed out clay version of this to hang out in :P Add a fire pit, a hole on top for ventilation and some seating.
Thank you. Hopefully my writing style will get better but I'm glad you think I'm on the right track. It would be amazing to see this from the inside. Sometimes I experiment with photogrammetry software not sure if you are familiar with this but you take lots of photos from different angles of the piece and then the software is able to create a 3d object which you can then view from all sides even travel inside to take a look at the empty space. I will show some examples in the future.
Ya, my best friend is a graphic designer. He uses photogrammetry quite often. Seen some of his work, it can be pretty impressive. Would love to see some of your examples!
What phenomenal work. I love the message of doing this sculpture on the beach where a high tide will eventually wash it away.
It reminds me of the sand mandalas made by Buddhist monks, which they finish and then throw into the sea.
Yes indeed, I watched the Buddhist monks making sand Mandala in Dublin years go before I start sand sculpture. As soon as they were finished they scooped it up and powered it into the river Liffey. I may have been one of the things that inspired me to give sand a try.
Amazing!
Bless you @bless
<3
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From now on you are on the green path to implement your kindness to everyone, hope you include the lucky people here.
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Beyond epic! Upvoted.