New Piece Shown Off In The Dark!

Manitou Gallery on Canyon Road here in Santa Fe had a show last night featuring new pieces.
They wanted something new from each of their artists.
They decided to hang the show salon style.
That means they kept sheets over everything until the grand unveiling at 5.00pm

The cosmic prankster decided to make their presence felt.
During the afternoon, ominous stormy clouds darkened the skies.

The gallery has a few small high windows and so relies on electrical spot lighting to show off the work.

The show had been hung and covered with the concealing sheets, and so the world waited for the appointed hour.
The sheets were pulled off on the dot of 5.

Unfortunately, as the clouds continued to darken a lightning strike took out power to the whole center of town just before the dot of 5.

No streetlights (there aren't many, anyway).
No traffic lights.
No illuminated shop windows.
And no lit up galleries.

It was like a cave in there!

And squatting in a case, in the darkest corner of the gallery were 7 stones.
Or they might as well have been stones, because that's what they looked like in the dark!

Ah, the irony of the cosmic prankster, eh?
Got to love that sense of humor!

Had the lights been on, show goers would have been treated to a bunch a frogs just like this one, only with a varying range of patinas.

It's about 4" long, which fills my hand quite nicely. A tennis ball is nearly 3 inches across, so if you had something squishy about the size of a tennis ball, and squished it so it went a bit longer and thinner, that would be about right size wise.

All I  need now is a pond to put him by...
I suppose the tub will have to do.
He can sit under one of Meridee's plants.

Basking Frog - Front 3 quarter - Bronze 4" - Steve Worthington

Basking Frog - Rear 3 quarter - Bronze 4" - Steve Worthington

Basking Frog - Back View - Bronze 4" - Steve Worthington

Basking Frog - Front - Bronze 4" - Steve Worthington

Basking Frog - Side - Bronze 4" - Steve Worthington

Basking Frog - with soda for scale - Bronze 4" - Steve Worthington

 

 

Besides that, my artist grid cards on Kickstarter are going great, and have only 7 days to go!

Click these links to visit my website... SteveWorthingtonArt.com - Sculpture that loves you back
or my Etsy store, CritterVille

Toadem Pole: It's a totem pole made of frogs (or toads)...

Wax and clay original of my toadem pole

I've been having far too much fun playing with my home grown building blocks, as you can see!

The top frog is a double header.
Besides sporting a pair of wings (it is a totem pole after all) the toad in pole position is looking forwards and backwards at the same time.



Looks to me like it might also make for a very unusual rapier handle...

...or candlestick holder...

...or a fire stoker handle...

...you know once you start making things, you just keep coming up with more things to make!

.
Click these links to visit my website... SteveWorthingtonArt.com - Sculpture that loves you back

or my Etsy store, CritterVille

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Through a glass darkly...here's a spooky looking scene...

Cut up bits and pieces embedded in mold material, waiting to be cut out so waxes can be made.

You might recognize the snail from one of my shoe horns, and of course a tree frog which I'm making as a stand alone wall mounted frog.

That isn't Rumplestiltskin in the background spinning straw into gold, it's Lee flattening the bottoms of my Bumper to Bumper mid size turtles.
Somehow he manages to keep his fingers off that fast spinning abrasive disk (I'm very glad to say).

Click these links to visit my website... SteveWorthingtonArt.com - Sculpture that loves you back
or my Etsy store, CritterVille

Top to bottom tree frogs, and my first New Mexico rattler...

After I posted some out door 'tree frogs on a vine' close ups (but no complete top to bottom single images since I was going to do them inside),  Deborah Paris commented...

'the natural light makes them look fantastic. Anyway you can photograph the whole thing that way in a natural environment? It would look super!'

So I thought I'd do both!
The 'no distractions' way (might as well take advantage of how dark it gets here at night!), and around a pond.
Good job I got around to it quickly too. The inferno of color from the leaves was gone the very next day after a severe frost, and it even snowed last night.

This pond has bullfrogs in it (too cold to find any now though!)

2 different patinas

So thanks Deborah, great idea and right in the nick of time!

I still have to tidy up the indoor pics I just took (lots of dust on the table surface etc).

A couple of days before halloween I ran into my first rattlesnake since moving to Santa Fe five years ago.
I'd encountered a couple in California out walking about on some hiking trails (I wouldn't call myself a hiker: I start crying, sit on the floor, thrash about while turning purple and refuse to walk any further after about an hour and a half).

This time we were driving home and I saw a snake in the road.
As per usual I pulled over and jumped out, as I've often done before to encourage with my feet what is usually a bullsnake to get out of the road.

This time it was a rattler.
It had some blood on it, wasn't moving, but looked alive in a normal snakey pose (plus it wasn't flat yet!).
I noticed it was a very pale sandy color with very distinct markings, and some black and white bands by its rattle (which was up, but wasn't rattling).

My guess is it was hit once, maybe just dead, maybe nearly dead.
Anyhow, caution being the better part of valor where I'm concerned, I didn't attempt to usher it to safety since I didn't have a broom or anything on me.

A bit later we drove past the same spot where it was a barely noticeable ring of snake jerky on the road, and the next day there was no sign of it at all.

Eager to identify it, I googled some descriptions, home ranges and pics of various New Mexico rattlers and in the process saw some rather gruesome photos of hands that had been bitten.
They looked like rather gory balloon animals or over cooked sausages that had burst on the grill.
Chilling, to say the least!
Anyhow, I reckon it was a Western Diamondback, and it was right at the entrance to the community college which is right near a lot of houses.
So I didn't feel too bad that I couldn't save it!

And if you really want to give yourself a scare, do a google image search for 'rattlesnake bite'!

Click these links to visit my website... SteveWorthingtonArt.com - Sculpture that loves you back
or my Etsy store, CritterVille

Tree frogs in my back yard?! Some bronze tree frogs on a vine.

I haven't got around to photographing the whole piece from top to bottom in one photo yet, so here's a bunch of close ups of my recently finished 'Tree Frogs on a Vine' bronze sculpture, in an edition limited to 250.

You can't beat shooting bronze in the dying embers of the sun's as it bids goodnight over the horizon.

I imagine I will post the whole piece this weekend, shot more traditionally indoors...

I tried out a couple of different patinas (or to be more precise, Mike Masse did).
He always does a stellar job.
Can't quite make my mind up which one I like best.

I'll probably go with the one that matches the Froggyballs.

Tree frog 'Rolls Royce of shoe horns' progress, museum show, and my mouse project book is officially in the mail...

The tree frog shoe horn is coming along, after a few glitches (described in an earlier post).
But I'm liking how it's coming along (not so thrilled with my photography skills on this bunch of pics!).

I decided to fill in the hole that hangs it on the nail, and have the frog hollow, with a keyhole shape cut into the leaf on the back side (only the keyhole is upside down) so it hangs magically on the wall.

I think this one and the snail complement each other nicely.

Or will when they're done, after molding, wax pulling, wax chasing, investing, burnout, bronze casting, de-molding, metal chasing, and patina. That's quite a process!

So it might take a while!
But it is the Rolls Royce of shoe horns, after all.

I filled the hole in and will hang it 'invisibly'

unfinished wax original (yet to be molded)

unfinished frog on leaf shoehorn

In the meantime I'll just have to make do with the cheapo and unsightly (but perfectly functional) shoe horn I bought from WalMart.

I recently published 'The Mouse Project' through Lulu.com, but have it set to 'private' until I get to see the printed book. It should arrive on Wednesday.
If all's well, I'll hit the 'public' button then and immediately post that it's alive and kicking!

I can hardly wait, I'm very excited to see the printed version, having been messing about with it for ages now on my computer.
Thanks to all the amazing work from 21 other artists I'm sure it will look great!

My Froggyballs and Athos, Porthos and Aramis the turtles are on display in the Albuquerque Museum's Miniatures and More show for this year which opens tonight, so I'm eager to find out how that goes.

Froggyball #1  a soda can,  and    Froggyball #2

Athos (top), Porthos (bottom left) and Aramis (bottom right)

Last year's turnout was very impressive, as I'm sure it will be this year too.

I'm working on some new mousey things which I'll no doubt post about very soon.
And I'm still planning on taking some pics of the critters in the pumpkin patch.

It's fun having a few balls up in the air at once!

Thanks for reading...

Click these links to visit my website... SteveWorthingtonArt.com - Sculpture that loves you back
or my Etsy store, CritterVille

What are these spooky structures in the hills of Santa Fe? And a new contest next week...

Next post will be my 100th blog post so I'll give away a couple of mice in a contest I'll announce then.
There will be two ways to win. One mouse for winning the contest, another mouse for mentioning the contest (with a link) on your blog, so stay tuned, especially if you (or a friend) also have a blog...

OK, back to this week.
Meridee went hiking up near the Santa Fe ski hill with her friend and author Elizabeth Gilchrist.
They went a bit off the beaten track and encountered some strange structures. Each was made of many tree trunks assembled teepee style around a living tree. They look like they took some serious effort to make, and they kept finding more, ever larger ones the further into the woods they went.

They got a bit spooked and turned and left!

I went back there with Meridee for a look, and snapped a few pics. They really are a bit of a head scratcher.

As you can see they're quite large, completely impenetrable except for a doorway, have bits of chopped off log to sit on inside, and there's several of them.

After a few beers we decided we'd probably head back there on the summer solstice and see if there's any curious shenanigans going on, since our imaginations got the better of us while we wondered what they might all be about!

Any ideas? I'd love to hear them!

Sculpture news!
Here's Lee Wilson's mold making handiwork in progress for my tree frogs on a vine sculpture.
Hopefully we'll have that piece all finished up and photographed in a couple of months.
His artful molds look like abstract sculptures.

I've been working on a couple of other things, one of which will combine some elements I haven't seen done before.
Which probably means every one has done it, but I just haven't noticed!

I'm being a bit coy about it until it's further along, but I showed some of the elements to Lee who will be making my mold, pulling waxes, and what have you.

Here's Lee in 'action'.

I enjoy running things by him since he can suggest practical considerations to make them more efficiently.
If they can be done without infringing on the integrity of my idea, I'll go for it.
In this case, he suggested slightly thickening the sides of a rectangular part to ensure the bronze will flow more freely and create fewer failed castings, which I took care of.

With many years of experience in all aspects of the casting process, he is a great source of 'insider knowledge', and I like take advantage of it whenever I can!

OK, what's the mystery critter in this pic? I snapped it at a nearby gardening nursery that has a pond...
(by the way, this is not the contest, that's next week!)

So don't forget to stay tuned for next weekend's contest announcement...


Click these links to visit my website... SteveWorthingtonArt.com - Sculpture that loves you back
or my Etsy store, CritterVille

Contest: Guess the length of the snake and win a bronze turtle!

I said this week's post would be more fun!

I ran into Marcel, a photographer friend out running with his dogs around our local trail the other day.
Well I suppose to be more accurate he ran into me, since I was walking!
He'd recently been round our place to photograph my tree frog (the real one) to use as part of one of his always interesting compositions....

Cutle little critter, eh?

Well, after Marcel ran off in his direction and I walked off in mine, I found this rather handsome beast!
Marcel must have run right past it!

A fine looking specimen of a bull snake, I'm sure you'll agree!

And whoever can guess closest to how long the snake is will win a tiny bronze turtle.
The bigger one, since I'm all out of the smallest one right now!

Not a very spectacular prize, but then again, not a very involved contest! Just take a wild guess and either leave it as a comment on this post or email it to me.

Closing date is my next blog post when I'll announce the winner, whenever that is (most likely the weekend of May 15/16), so if this is still the most recent post, have a go!

I'm adding this after only a day since I've had such a great response already: at this rate it's entirely possible by the close of this contest multiple people could guess it right, in which case I'll assign them numbers and roll a dice to determine the winner.

Only one guess per person though, so don't email every size by the inch between 1 and 100 feet!

I'll take these snake pics with me back to the spot and lay out a string to match its position, then measure it.

Good luck!


Click these links to visit my website... SteveWorthingtonArt.com - Sculpture that loves you back
or my Etsy store, CritterVille

Update on ....of...... Galleries, last I heard is that he's not responding to phone calls and emails from the collection folks who are trying to recover my share of his selling some bronzes of mine. (Edit-issue resolved after 1 yr thanks to Goldman, Evans and Trammell)