The 4 Noble Truths
1. True sufferings
2. True origins
3. True cessations
4. True paths
24″ X 50″ X 144″ (stainless base to be 48″ square X 1/4″ in progress)
“the four noble truths” was fabricated in bronze sheets, stainless steel and carbon steel as frame work. to view here it seems finished enough…wrong! i barely had time to finish all the tac welds before the show (march21st), the patina was hurried and therefore inconsistent with my expectations. i had wanted a solid blackish patina, not the blotchy spotty mess i ended with. my fault because i truly had way too much on my plate! with seven new pieces, new warehouse, new gallery, new salon, collaborative mediums through out the space and an opening after a two years hiatus…suffering was my middle name.
the carbon steel flat sheets were taken to a local powder coater here in tucson, north american powder coating. mark the owner is a wonderful guy from ohio! he loves heat man thats all i can say! he chose to move to the desert buy a business that requires excessive heat to melt/cure the paints onto metal in these huge ovens. tho, i guess i’m not to different in this “heat” arena! i actually shaved my head about five years ago due to a major meltdown in august. it was just one of those days where my hood would not stay, because of the heat it wanted to slide down my head, every weld it knocked on my clavicle and therefore i couldn’t see a damn thing! drips were running down the backs of my legs, pits wreaked…you get the picture. i dashed off to the nearest pharmacy and bought some hair clippers! made sense at the time, right? within minutes my world seemed so much freer, lighter, cooler…scary! i had shaved the back of my head like a road map. i kid you not…by the time the whole head was shaved all i heard from my daughters was how spiritual i looked? needless to say my head shape is not one where it accentuates my positives. ok back to metal.., he first sand blasts the metal to get all oils/dirt off. then the powder (paint) is put on and baked. after the powder coating, which generally is less than a week, i attached the finished green panels to the framework, just under the bronze panels by pop rivets.(in the eastern beliefs of chakras, i connected with the heart chakra, which is green and is the fourth chakra. it symbolizes the obvious, but it is also about letting go,to let go of attachments within this life, a major source of suffering.)
the bronze sheets came all the way from seattle! i had them shipped directly to a metal shop that laser cut the japanese caligraphy of the stated truths in Buddhism. initially i had thought about cutting them myself with my plasma cutter however bronze is a very soft metal due to its high percentage of copper in it, when heat hits it it spreads out quickly whereas with stainless it stays very hot, more centralized. had i cut them the metal would have warped and the edges would be far too rough a finish for this refined piece. with a computerized laser the cut is made utilizing water as a source to keep the metal cool. after the bronze panels were tac welded to the frame i started welding the moon together. first the stainless was rolled and cleaned and then my favorite part, the long welds. this leads me into another post…i must show you in close-up the stage where the metal butts (ready for welding), the finished weld and then the clean-up of sanding it, how all three stages look. check back for the pictures of welds from start to finish! but first let me finish my thoughts thus far…the moon is a symbol for many countries and civilizations so without getting to heavy into it it was the feminine quality that resonated into this piece. it is also why i picked the cross section holding the moon. if you take another look back you’ll notice it closely resembles the symbol for alchemy! i transformed it into my own symbol..that of a human resting upon the moon. tho as a Buddhist i also see a conceptual tantric symbol.
next post will include pictures of welds and the dismantling of the sculpture and the story behind it (maquette trickery). i will also post later the actual cost sheet to fabricate this and some other little anectdotes to the process…stay tuned and please comment if there are questions….or not.