Comments on: Lace metal welding sculptures

Lace metal welding sculptures

peacay — Sat, 02 Feb 2008 21:43:35 -0800

From her isolated rural New York property, Cal Lane produces amazing filigree lace patterned sculptures by welding everyday and found objects. My favourites are the shovels and wheelbarrows. Background at New York Times and NSCAD University. [via gardenhistorygirl]

By: The Light Fantastic

The Light Fantastic — Sat, 02 Feb 2008 22:09:18 -0800

The shovels and wheelbarrows are awesome! Very interesting work.

By: StickyCarpet

StickyCarpet — Sat, 02 Feb 2008 23:01:11 -0800

More like "cutting with a torch" than welding, but whatever you call it she sure does a lot of it.

By: Tube

Tube — Sat, 02 Feb 2008 23:07:36 -0800

Cool stuff, though perhaps it should be mentioned that the pieces shown in these links have been cut, not welded. Seattle has some similar public art on display which I find really outstanding (self link).

By: Kadin2048

Kadin2048 — Sun, 03 Feb 2008 00:34:44 -0800

Wow. I just stared at the one called "Fabricate" for a long time. He did that with an oxy-acetelyne torch? By hand?

By: From Bklyn

From Bklyn — Sun, 03 Feb 2008 00:40:47 -0800

That last link, gardenhistorygirl, is very cool. So is the filigree cut into steel, obviously.

By: pracowity

pracowity — Sun, 03 Feb 2008 01:20:15 -0800

He did that with an oxy-acetelyne torch? By hand? art degree + welding degree = lots of fancy plasma cutting And he is a she. A Canadian woman, born in Nova Scotia, who has also worked as an art professor, welder, veterinary nurse, and hairdresser.

By: nickyskye

nickyskye — Sun, 03 Feb 2008 02:36:41 -0800

As usual peacay, you find treasure. I'd seen Cal Lane's lace shovels a while back but not this visual feast of her work. It's lovely. Reminds me a bit of the laciness of henna patterns. The delicacy defies the rigidity of the metal. Such a sensual contrast. She's truly innovated something wonderful and quite humorous too in its clash/mesh of mucho macho and utterly delicate. Thanks for that info about the plasma cutting pracowity. Another metal cutting artist: Tom Wesselmann's original idea, that began the cut-out works, was to preserve the process and immediacy of his drawings from life, complete with the false lines and errors, and realize them in steel. At the same time, he pursued another idea - to make tiny, very fast doodles, which he would then enlarge in cut-out metal, preserving the feel and spontaneity of the tiny sketch. After these cut-out drawings are painted by Wesselmann and nailed tight to a white wall, they have a very intense presence, impossible to anticipate without actually seeing them. In black or shades of gray they look like they have been drawn directly on the wall, but at the same time the thickness of the metal makes a vital contribution to the force and presence of the image. Wesselmann described his elation with the first examples, saying it was as if he could pick up a drawing by the lines, remove it from a piece of paper and hang it, unchanged, on the wall. He referred to these cut-outs as steel drawings.

By: jessamyn

jessamyn — Sun, 03 Feb 2008 13:07:06 -0800

Plasma cutters are one of the most ubermensch-y tools out there. You hang on to this poker thng, press a button and steel just vaporizes underneat it in a shower of sparks. I was never able to get sophisticated enough with it to do anything incredibly useful but I've always held a special regard for people who could. Thanks for this peacay and the via link to the garden history blog where many other lovely things hide.