Success in Life

If success is defined by how much money you have, I don't know much about success. If you define it more as substance of character, I'm doing alright. One might think the latter would lead to the former; good character will lead to financial success. The book of Job in the Bible debunks that myth. Job had it all. One day Satan came to God and God said, so what do you think of my servant Job? Satan said, he's a great guy, but you've protected him and given him a life of ease, take that away and he will curse you to your face. God said, ok, go for it, but don't harm him physically.

I'm sure Satan smiled and went on his way, ready to wreak havoc and have fun doing it. You know the type. So Satan puts some things in motion and everything Job owns is stolen and his grown children are killed. Job mourns. His friends come along and tell him to repent from whatever it is that he's done wrong and God will restore his fortune.

Ok, right here is where many people make the mistake of listening to the "experts." Go look up traits or habits of successful people and you will find plenty of advice.

Job says to them, I've done nothing wrong, God can do with me as he wants, who am I to say what God can do. God gives and God takes away, in both I will honor God.

This made his friends angry. How dare this guy who is obviously being punished by God talk back to them, the favored of God. They tell him so and still Job sticks to what he said. Even Jobs wife (notice Satan never threatens to take the wife) says, "Curse God and die."

Satan checks in with God. God says, so what do you think now? Ok, take away his health and he will curse you to your face. Go for it, God says.

Boils break out on Jobs skin. His friends, the "experts" come along and now feel vindicated. Didn't they say he should repent? Obviously this is God's punishment for not listening to them and not repenting from the evil he has done, whatever it was.

Jobs says the same thing. I've done nothing wrong. God gives and God takes away, I'll honor him in both. Oh the self-righteous indignation, they cover their ears and howl to drown out Jobs pitiful excuses.

Satan checks in with God. God says, satisfied now? Satan leaves in a huff. Now God says to Job, tell your friends to quit giving you advice or I'll do to them what I've done to you, and you are right, I can do what I want with my creation. God never tells Job why. The one thing Job did was ask why, he was never told. So his friends saw the error of their way and God restored Jobs wealth to even greater wealth and he had seven sons, and three daughters, which were known as the most beautiful women in the land. I don't remember if the story relates anything about Job's wife after all this. I wonder if she died and he remarried, since he had grown children, wouldn't his wife have been beyond child bearing years to produce seven sons and three daughters after all this? I don't know.

How this relates to success nowadays. The "experts" aren't always right and can be dead wrong. I've learned not to listen to advice. I'm the one with the ideas, not them. I know what I can do, not them. I'm the creative one, not them.

Ignore the people that tell you that you can't do it. There are some people that just can't stand the thought of you being successful, they aren't, so you shouldn't be either. Are you the type of person that makes decisions regardless of the outcome? Job could have went along with his friends advice to get back in their good grace and may have profited from it. He wouldn't.

If success is merely money, criminals that don't get caught are successful. That's not my idea of success. I would call that a dismal failure of a person. If they could actually get away with stealing a fortune, they are smart enough to have earned one.

Good character is not always recognized for what it is. Job's was not, not for awhile anyway, and we don't know how long he suffered under false accusations. Imagine the rumors and the derision he must have put up with. The book of Micah sums up success; To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.  Money is not success. Job was successful while broke and sick.

If you want to be successful at what you do; work at it. I have put years into sculpture and having nothing to show for it except a bunch of nice sculptures sitting on shelves. But the work has led to me to being a better sculptor. Regardless of the outcome, I keep working at it. You have to produce. My work has led me to sculpting marble. Now I have to work at producing marble sculpture, which has led me to find a marble deposit while looking for marble suppliers. Now I may become a supplier myself. You never know where knowledge will take you, learn everything that interests you or is related to what you do, however remotely related, you never know where it will lead. 

Looking back on my life, little successes have taught me what I can do. That's why I don't listen to people that tell me I can't. I know better, I've done it before. But if you never try, if you never take an idea that people may, and probably will ridicule, you'll never know, and you'll never know what you're made of. I've had people ridicule ideas while they worked. Don't listen to people that tell you that you can't. They will even tell you that you can't while you are successfully doing it. 

Hopefully some things to think on. 

Being Positive

Katy Perry is having a contest to win a private concert by her. A high school on Abilene, Texas has made a two minute video using "Roar" as inspiration. The video is inspiring. Here it is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BqdDNKRfVtI 

 I came across it while trying to watch a video about a local one-legged foot ball player. (American football) That video wouldn't play so I played the contest video because the caption was about being positive and that is a subject that usually pisses me off. I will relate this to art, just wait.

This video is actually positive, I love it. It shows a problem and how to fix it. That's positive. My problem with "positive" people is they usually aren't positive, they just say they are, they act positive, but they are hard to be around. Real positive people do stuff. They work out the problems, or see the problems and forge ahead anyway. Fake positive people complain about people that see problems. Fake positive people will keep happily doing the same wrong thing over and over because they are happy and positive. You know the type?

In the video the popular, look-down-on-everybody-else-people, are the fake positive people, always happy, always happily, continually doing the wrong thing. (not all popular people are like that) Some people make such a habit of being popular that all they know is; put on a happy face and be positive!  Their lives are very narrow; who can I impress and where do I have to be next? They live by their schedule and question nothing. Socrates complained about these people also. Thinking takes effort, and thinking that only being "positive" is the answer is a narrow minded view.

You can come to a problem and be happy about it, and solve it happily. That's great. But you have to recognize it first, and "positive" people have taught themselves that recognizing problems is negative. When I hit a problem, and that's what it feels like to me, I slam into it and it surprises me and I let out a cuss word, or a few, or even a string of them. Now I'm all worked up and my brain is burning to solve the problem, and I do. That's positive too.

The art part, I told ya, here it is: Unless you're one of those super talented people who just whips out fantastic art, you're going to have problems with your art. I had one today. I wanted to remove a lot of stone quickly because this sculpture is taking too long. I thought about driving to town to look for some carbide or diamond tools. Part of the problem is when I get on an idea I stick with it till it works or I prove it won't. So going to town could be a waste of time, but I don't know, but I figure any time I save with better tools will be offset by the time spent running around. I decide to stay and work with what I've got.

I've had bigger problems, like the first sculpture I did was terrible, but I figured I could do better, and I have. However I didn't just get better by being happy. Plenty of times I was pissed. The ideal picture of an artist calmly working . . . that's not me. Maybe most of the time, but not all the time. I had to do research on different types of clay, tools, how they are used. This isn't the type of thing a fake positive person will do.

Managers are often promoted because they are fake positive. They are always happy, but they can't even recognize a problem, they are just yes men. This is a big problem where I work. I come to managers with problems and solutions and I always hear; You're right, but there's nothing we can do about it. These people are so bad at solving problems they can't even implement a solution when its given to them. That is not positive.

Facebook is a very depressing place, some study shows, I read somewhere. The reason is people post positive things making it look like their lives are perfect and it depresses people who don't have "perfect" lives. That's fake positive. Everyone has problems. Positive people just solve them, whether they are happy while doing it or not. So next time you're articulating a problem to work out the solution and someone says you're being negative, solve the problem and tell them; "that's being positive." And then ask them, "How is telling me I'm negative a positive thing?" They will shut up, they don't know how to figure out answers.

"Be positive" is such a common phrase. What needs to be common is "Work out the problem." That's much harder and will never be popular. But it's what gets things done.

Bernini - The Movie

Why hasn't anyone done a movie on Bernini? Or have they? Let me know if there's something besides a documentary. He was a rock star in Italy in the 1600's. Child prodigy artist. Sculptor. Carved masterpieces in marble as a teenager. He was good, and he knew it. He was charming, and he knew it, knew how to use it. Became a close friend of the Pope. Also did architecture. A bit of a narcissist. Fame went to his head.

He fell in love . . . with a married woman. She cheated on him with his brother. He found out and almost killed his own brother, breaking a couple of his brother's ribs. He sent his servant to his lover's house, to slash her face and disfigure her, which he did.

Constanza, or Constance, Bernini's lover.

His brother went to jail for fighting, his lover went to jail for adultery, his servant went to jail. Bernini got a warning. Things never change. Celebrities get away with everything. And he was made to marry a beautiful woman in hopes of keeping him in line. I bet she loved that arrangement. I wonder what she did to deserve Bernini.

Along comes a rival, somewhere in this timeline, I'm not sure exactly when, but a reserved and talented architect arises, Borromini. He is building buildings in ways no one had thought of before, beautiful buildings. Buildings Bernini could only dream of building.

That's ok, Bernini is friends with the Pope. The Pope assigns Bernini to build onto the Church Michelangelo designed. Here's Bernini's chance to outdo Michelangelo. Over the top, so to speak, by building towers higher than Michelangelo's original dome. Bernini has already pissed off Borromini by consulting him on other jobs and then not giving him any credit. A habit he has with his assistants too. He does not consult Borromini on this one, to his detriment.

Bernini, outdoing Michelangelo with his own version of David.

His high and heavy towers begin to crack, and not just crack ,but crack down into the rest of the church. The foundation cannot hold the weight. The church consults Borromini, he tells them the problem and the Pope orders the towers torn down. Bernini also, finally is torn down, well maybe not torn down, just feeling sorry for himself. He becomes depressed and becomes sick from lying around not eating. He recovers, he still gets commissions. And finally he gets commissioned by the church to build a chapel, or shrine, whatever they call it, to Saint Teresa. He borrows design ideas from Borromini and uses his own flare for the theatrical and of course his world class sculpting skills to produce this:

This is only part of it, look it up, the Ecstasy of St. Teresa. 

The story has everything, and it's true. Why hasn't anyone made a movie of this?  It can even be twisted to be anti-Christian, which Hollywood loves to do. One more pic:

See those leaves. Those were sculpted by an assistant, Giuliano Finelli. Hats off to you Giuliano!

Russian Sculpture Artist and Russia and Stuff

I got bored with seeing the same ol' photos on Google every time I searched for photos of marble sculpture. I get quite a few readers from Russia so I thought I would see what's going on over there. I found this guy:
http://www.sculptureinrussia.com/en/painters/13.htm
He did this sculpture and relates to my last post on modern art. (this photo is also on the page linked above)

Here's a good example of a simple form done right. It's supposed to look primitive. The lines all go where they should. This does not look like somebody was trying to do a realistic torso and failed. No part jumps out at me screaming "I'm in the wrong place!" or "I shouldn't even be here!" This is one of those simple forms you can look at and feel all is well.

Hats off to all you Russian artists. Always wanted to go there, even during the 80's when we were supposed to hate each other. I remember high school classmates whose number one fear was that the USSR was going to nuke us. I was like, "No way, people over there don't want to nuke us anymore than we want to nuke them." I was right. Ha. And Russian women are the most beautiful in the world, except for maybe Montana.

I met a Russian in the late 80's in Reno, Nevada at a live show. He was sitting next to me at anther table. He introduced himself and asked what we did for a living. I told him we worked in a lumber mill. He asked what we did there and something about a high position because I said, "No, we're just workers, lowly workers." He said no one would believe him that a couple of mill workers could afford to go to a such an opulent place to see a show. I said I'd have to come over and see him then. Still haven't gotten over there.  Now meeting Russians is common. There are quite a few here in Missoula. Russian immigrants here have a bad reputation. Every one of them I have met and have been very nice. I think the bad reputation is a hold over from when we were supposed to hate Russians, so now people still make up reasons why they were supposed to hate. As far as I'm concerned you're welcome here, and I still hope to get over there someday.

Modern Art Bullshit

I can't stand it anymore. I gotta say it. Most modern art, or a lot of it, is crap. There. Yeah, yeah, yeah, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. But grammar is grammar, and logic is logic. And what those soulless, talentless hacks write about their work makes no sense. Oh, your sculpture looks like a rock you picked up out of a river so it must mean you have deep thoughts that are impossible to put into words? Bullshit. Or it looks like some caveman drawing (which were better than modern art) or because it's a simple form with no features, it says something a real piece of art wouldn't have? Bullshit.

I won't be surprised by insulting, angry comments on this article or of my own work, but believe me, I'm a much worse critic of my own work than anyone else. I like some abstract or simple forms. Some of them mesmerize me and I can't help but stare at them. Some of them, on the other hand, make me want to say what I said above. This just may be a "beauty in the eye of the beholder" thing and nothing more. Maybe other people, maybe even most people (and not surprising that I'm not like most people) like the art that doesn't look like art. But if you told me you would rather have a sculpture of a rock that looks like it was just found that way over a Michelangelo or a Bernini, I would say, "Bullshit."

Getting back to the bullshit they say about their own work or their experience; I don't care. You shouldn't have to explain your work. I don't even like giving a title to mine. But sometimes a title brings it all together, and I like that. What inspired this article (or venting) was an artist who sculpts stone, but you can hardly tell they are sculpted, or they look like beginner stuff. He studied in Italy. And he creates crap. I guess people are fooled by, "I studied in Italy under a master." I don't get it. If you study under a master, it better damn well look like it. You shouldn't have to tell me.

I love writing, I hate writing about art. Art should speak for itself. I remember writing a paper in college on the Laocoon. I had to just fill it with filler. Just look at the sculpture.

Or go look for a better picture of it and look at it. That is an awesome sculpture. You can see the snakes winning. You can see them constricting and the struggle of the man and his boys, and the look on his face, knowing he's in trouble and he would do anything to save his sons. But you want a sculpture of a rock that looks like you just found it? Bullshit. I guarantee you the unknown sculptor of this didn't write a page of bullshit explaining his sculpture.

I know people make the illogical jump to thinking I must think my art work is the best out there. No, I don't. But it looks like something and it takes some skill to do it. It takes very little skill to take a rock and make a smaller rock. I think those people should talk more about marketing, because that's what they are really good at. They are the type of people that could sell a snowball to an Eskimo.

I'll end with this: Arggghh. Be a pirate.

Marble Sculpture

Here is my first marble sculpture. I did not make a clay model because I could just use my own hand as a model. I like sculpting marble, it is now my first choice for sculpting. I found sculpting down to where I want is kinda nice, instead of building up, and constantly fixing everything as ya go. There is not much info on sculpting marble, a few videos of people sculpting, but they don't give away any secrets. One day I'll have to go to Italy and take a vacation/sculpting class.

I got a commission for a marble sculpture before I even finished this one, two actually. The first one (black and white dog) is going to be difficult because I said I could splice two different color stones together . At first I thought I was only doing a black patch on his face and one ear. Then I saw other pics of him and his body is at least half black. So this sculpture is going to be a real challenge, but well worth it. The other is a black horse head with a white star. Not so bad, I'm sure I can inlay the white star on black marble.

I also went searching for local stone. I knew from building a rock wall on my house (sold that house) that there is some sedimentary rocks up the Blackfoot River Canyon which are colored red, purplish, and green. I tested their sculpt-ability and it looks like they might work. I've been putting off starting one, but will start shortly, as soon as I'm done procrastinating. Or I should say letting my creativity ferment till it explodes, that sounds more artsy. Coffee helps too. One more cup? Yeah. 

A little about sculpting this: I started to make a woman turning her head with her chin against her shoulder, looking kinda sly, or shy. It was coming along and then the nose just popped right off. So I turned it into a fist. I knew it wasn't quite wide enough for a full sized fist, but to make it smaller so that it would be to scale meant removing a whole lot more rock, so I just went with it. Also not enough stone where the thumb would be, went with that too. I think it looks pretty good, a little narrow and the thumb isn't quite what I wanted but It was a good experiment in "making it work."

About the nose popping off: I noticed upon finishing that a crack runs across the thumb and into the first finger. I suppose that crack probably ran where the nose used to be because it took very little to pop it off. I was using my point chisel pointed away from the nose and barely tapping and it took off the whole nose. To pop off such a large piece isn't that easy even when trying.

If you're interested in commissioning any of my past sculptures into marble, or your own ideas, contact me. I would love to do a large monument sized sculpture.You can see my other sculptures at http://clay-tablet.wix.com/clayworkman if the link doesn't work, copy and paste, that will.

Sculpting Marble for the First Time.

For some reason I got it in my head to sculpt marble. Never thought I would want to sculpt stone. Wood was bad enough. Wood though has grain, and knots, and splits when you don't expect it to, due to cross grain and knots. Marble on the other hand is uniform in texture. I bought a small piece and a starter set of tools (I see I need more) and away I went, after watching youtube videos, which weren't all that helpful. Except for what basic tools do, and I only have basic tools.

I took on too much. I thought I would sculpt a woman's face turned into her shoulder. I was doing it, but when I got to chopping out the waste between her nose and her shoulder, her nose popped right off. So now it's going to be a fist. I can use my own fist as a model, so that's a plus. It's working out so far.

You can see where I drew her shoulder. I might not have enough to do the thumb properly. It will be close.

I love sculpting the stone. If I can get this down, this will be my new medium of choice. But I will still sculpt in clay, I need to be able to look at a figure while sculpting in stone. I'm already looking into trips to Italy. Not going to happen anytime soon. There is a marble quarry in Colorado I might visit, it's a lot closer to Montana than Italy. Funny thing, that quarry in Colorado is owned by the company that owns the Carrera quarry in Italy, and most of that stone from Colorado goes to Italy. It must be pretty good stuff. This stone I'm using is Carrera marble. Known for being the best due to it's whiteness and fine crystals. That's what I gather anyway, I'm no expert. So that's what's new. Later.

New Marblex Sculptures and info.

I opened a studio. So nice to not work in cat hair. And paying rent makes make me sculpt more. Now that I'm away from my cat, I don't have dirt and hair in my sculptures. But Marblex does have little sand-size bits of stone in it. I thought before my cat had knocked dirt down from a book shelf that was over my work area. Nope, there is actual little stones in it. I can't feel them when sculpting. I only notice them when I get to the end of my sculpture and it is drying a bit. When I scape an area or smooth an area, I'll uncover a stone. I guess they are in there for strength? I don't know. I called Amaco and asked them, the person I talked to wasn't very helpful, sounded like she was making it up as she went along. No answer as to why it's called self-hardening and not air-dry either. So don't count on smoothing or carving this stuff once it's dry. It is so hard it doesn't carve and smoothing with a wet sponge uncovers stones. Here's my latest.

Fast, his hair is being blown behind him. Going to sculpt his hands on a steering wheel.

Pirate woman, she's sad, not mad. She's an introspective pirate.

He's mad, and charging.

Amaco Marblex - Finished Sculpture

Angelina Jolie

The photo above is a little overexposed to get rid of shadows. Marblex doesn't come out quite that white, but it does look nice.

 I like Marblex. Now that I'm done with a sculpture and it's completely dry, I know how hard this stuff is: pretty darn hard. I don't have anything to test breaking points of different materials but I'll tell you what I know. Check out my other article on Marlbex for how it sculpts.

Somebody asked if you could add new clay to dry Marblex. Yes, and it works well. Wet the dry stuff and it gets soft, add the new stuff. It shrinks very little is one reason it works, it doesn't pull away from the layer beneath. I thought this stuff would be easy to sand like paper clay. It's not. With 400 and 600 grit sandpaper I can sand paper clay quickly. Marblex doesn't sand, it burnishes, which is nice; a polished stone-looking texture emerges. It's so hard that the sculpture sanded the sandpaper and tore the grit off. I had better luck with 1500 grit. Seems the smaller grit is just right to burnish the piece without the grit coming off on the sculpture.

Because I thought it would sand easily I didn't worry about getting every blemish and bump out before drying. I used the wet scrubby pad side of a cleaning sponge to smooth out the surface. Problem with that was little bits of the scrubby stuff would come off and get stuck in the wet clay. Gotta find something better and smooth the piece before it dries, save some trouble.

Amaco Self Hardening Clay - Stonex & Marblex Review

I have been experimenting.  I thought I had settled on Creative Paperclay as the best I had found and was trying to do some figurines. Takes way too long for me. Creative Paperclay is too mushy for me, it's about the consistency of bread dough. After getting the basic shape, I can't get any more detail in the mush and have to let it dry and then carve and sand for detail. Takes too long. I have 3 sculptures unfinished because I'm just tired of working on them. Too much down time waiting for the stuff to dry, which is why I did three at once. I figured I would always have one to work on. Didn't work out.

I went back to the first clay I ever sculpted with, Amaco Terre Cotta clay. This is clay that needs to be fired for strength, I don't have a kiln. I don't care. It was so nice to just sculpt again. First thing I did was sculpt a bust of a woman, from my imagination. I was going to sculpt a smiling Viking woman with a helmet on. She started looking African so I went with that, then changed her features a little and she just looks like a determined woman. One day, a few hours, and I was done. Not completely done, some sanding and not sure about that base.

I went and got some more clay and tried to sculpt Audrey Hepburn. Maybe not quite right, but pretty darn close. (not dry in this pic)

This took a weekend and watching a few Audrey Hepburn movies. I went back to get some more clay at Michael's, but they were out. I looked around and noticed Amaco makes a couple of self-hardening clays. They are non-toxic and most importantly feel and work almost exactly like regular ol' clay. I bought a 5 lb box of Stonex and a 2 lb box of Artists' Self Hardening Clay. The latter was very hard. Not sure if it was supposed to be that way or just dried out.  It was probably on the shelf too long and dry. I added water to it and it soaked it up. It worked pretty well, though a bit lumpy due to adding water, some areas were softer than others. I can't find it anywhere. Even Amaco doesn't list it in their products, and I looked by product number. I think it's been discontinued and it had been sitting on Michael's shelf for who knows how long. If anyone knows, let me know.

The Stonex sculpture I did was a little too big for only 5 lbs of clay, or my armature (loosely wadded up newspaper so it can shrink with the sculpture as it dries) was a little small, most likely the latter. I tend to keep adding to fix things rather than reshape, keeping a watch on that. I ran out of Stonex and used LaDoll to finish her hair, thus the very white parts of her hair. Stonex is supposed to be white, and here you can compare to the whiteness of LaDoll (the very white) and the whiteness of Stonex.

I need to sand this down. As it dried, every little bump got bumpier. At first I found Stonex to work almost exactly like clay. The problem comes keeping it wet. I spray my sculptures with water from time to time so that they don't dry out. Stonex became very sticky, it was like working marshmallow creme. Still, it was the best self hardening clay I had come across.

I went back to Michaels and picked up a box of Marblex, their last box. I learned my lesson from spraying water on the sculpture and didn't spray very much. Marblex never got sticky like the Stonex did. It looks like about the same color as Stonex, though I haven't let this sculpture dry yet, still working on it. I also ran out of clay and used Amaco Artists' Modeling Clay, which is an air-dry clay. Very nice stuff but probably doesn't dry as hard as Stonex or Marblex.

This is supposed to be Angelina Jolie. I've tweaked her nose and eyes since I took this pic. Pretty darn close from the side, I'd say it looks like her. From the front . . . I still have work to do.Waiting for ordered clay to finish this, next week.

I ordered 50 lbs of Marblex from www.Hyatts.com .  Good price. With the shipping, probably the same price I would get by ordering through Michael's. But I don't trust Michael's. They take forever to re-stock their shelves and I have found moldy (yes, mold that grows) clay there. And customer service is almost non-existent. I will say when I do talk to someone they are very nice and helpful, just rarely happens to catch someone who isn't trying to avoid customers.

Now that I've found a good self hardening clay which is durable and workable. I'm thinking I might set up a shop locally for portrait sculptures and whatever else my mind comes up with to sculpt. Sculpting a person right in front of me is a lot easier than sculpting from a few pictures. I don't need the person in front of me all the time either. Who wants to sit still for hours? Not me. See ya.