Traveling Benches, completed

For a log of the process, take a look at:
http://blueboathome.blogspot.com/2010/11/traveling-benches-part-2.html
http://blueboathome.blogspot.com/2010/10/travelling-benches-part-1.html

Ammo Table, part 5

Why use a religious symbol made from ammunition? 

The ties between faith and violence are many, and the debate rages as to which violent acts in the name of religion should be warranted, condoned, rejected, and denounced.  Even the perception that a religious group will use violence to its ends causes impassioned debates and ill-informed grandstanding (just try mentioning the words ‘ground zero’ and ‘mosque’ in a public place).

While I was working on the piece decided that I couldn’t in good faith use ammunition casings without understanding more about ‘gun culture’ in the U.S.  So, I took a basic handgun class at Get Some Guns & Ammo, LLC.

Most of the other folks in the class wanted to understand handguns for personal protection reasons.  It appears this was not uncommon for new handgun purchases, even thought the estimates for crimes deterred by gun use range from 100,000 per year to 2.5 million, and the methodology for determining what role gun ownership played is highly suspect and highly manipulated by weapon manufacturers and the NRA.  How on earth do you count the number of break-ins that didn’t happen because a robber suspected you owned a gun, or vice versa?

I’m not a gun owner, and have difficulty imagining a situation where I would want one other than during an apocalyptic societal breakdown (‘The Road’) or to hunt for cheeseburgers after In-N-Out is closed.  So, it was a good thing that most of the class was dedicated to understanding the safety principles and operation of the various types and calibers of weapons.

Afterwards we spent a good amount of time shooting different handguns on the indoor range.  My lasting impression of actually using .40cal and 9mm weapons was how violent the act of shooting was – the controlled explosion in my hands was in no way commensurate to the relatively delicate act of loading the clips and pulling the trigger.

And, it was thrilling.  To have that much power at my immediate disposal pushed all of my evolutionary buttons.  Gun designers and their advertising firms understand emotional triggers. 

Ammo Table, part 4

The search and procurement of empty ammunition casings has proven to be as interesting, if not more, than actually making this table.  So far I’ve been involved with the local police department, several shooting ranges, and friends and family with an interest in (or job that requires) guns.  The folks at “Get Some Guns & Ammo” (no, seriously) have been particularly helpful. 

As a side-note, I recently met a wonderful Australian couple deep inside Canyonlands National Park, and one of the things they wanted to do while in the States (besides exploring Canyonlands and climbing around the Rockies) was to shoot assault rifles.  I’m not sure if that statement said more about their sense of adventure or more about the perception of the American West – probably a bit of both.

The table structure and subsurface is near completion, and I’ve done a few smaller prototypes to make sure the effect will be striking enough.

And another image that I think might be particularly striking and invite some animated discussion:

Ammo Table, Part 3

Now that the search is underway and I’m gradually gathering these casings, I’ve found I should start figuring out what on earth I’m going to do with them when I get several thousand of the little suckers.  I’ve tried to approach prototyping my art like I approach voting -- do it early and often.

While fondling some of the casings (why is it everyone edges away from my table at the coffeehouse when I do this?) I realized that the open end and the closed end are two very different colors -- the shadow of the open end is dark, even when viewed outside, and the closed end is reflective.  Now I’ve got a direction -- I plan to arrange the casings open-end or closed-end up so that the resulting pattern depicts a portrait, kind of like if you zoom in on a digital black-and-white photograph.  At some great magnification, all you see is black or white pixels.  

Who would be an appropriate subject for a portrait out of spent ammunition?  Martin Luther King, Charles Taylor, and JFK all seem a little too trite and obvious.  Mickey Mouse?  The McDonald’s logo?  Here are a few ides, pixelated to the approximate degree they would be on the table.

Several years ago I did a series of sketches on Humphrey Bogart, and was fascinated with his eyes in particular.  Here are some that have potential for the table design.

Since pixelated computer graphics only have a small resemblance to bullets, I decided to prototype the image again, this time by drilling holes (representing the open-end-up shells) into a board with the graphic of Bogart’s eyes.

Ammo Table, Part 2

Old ammo casings are harder to get than I first realized.  Much of the brass is re-used, which is good news for landfills but bad news for ammunition artists.  As costs have gone up, shooting ranges are more and more apt to recycle the spent casings or sell them as scrap.

I live near a large, deserted desert where people like to shoot things.  There’s probably millions of ammo casings all over the sagebrush, but fighting the rattlesnakes and 120 degree heat will have to wait until I become really desperate.

This would be a good time to mention that I don’t have much experience with guns, or shooting them, or really anything about them except that when a loaded one shows up in Act 1 it needs to get fired in Act 3.

I enjoy that a simple mechanism can be so controversial among thoughtful, considerate, and generally educated people.  Cell phones, for example,  have a much more complicated technological infrastructure and design, yet they don’t evoke nearly the emotional response that guns do.  Forget presidential debates -- lets hear Yoko Ono and Charlton Heston verbally duke it out on gun control with Larry King moderating.  What a ripe area for discussion.

There are a few artists out there who work with modern weapons as a medium, and very few who make furniture from them.  I recently ran across this lamp in Copenhagen, although I think the trigger should have been wired to turn it on and off:

Also see:


http://alfarrow.com/reliquaries/

http://sashaconstable.co.uk/projects/peace-art

http://weburbanist.com/2009/01/05/20-artworks-of-war-bizarre-gun-and-bullet-art/

Ammo Table, Part 1

I get a lot of questions about how I get my ideas for sculptures and furniture.  I have yet to find a way to describe my creative process simply or concisely, hence this journal to show my internal (and external) wrestling matches that bring about a new piece.

Recently I’ve been thinking about how to choose what materials to use for building tables.  Michael Pollan started his fantastic book ‘The Omnivore’s Dilemma’ with the simple question:  “What’s for dinner?”  Possible answers have expanded greatly in the past 100 years.

Similarly, the vast array of materials that can be formed into a flat surface for a table have also multiplied.  Plastic, concrete, metal, wood, glass, Styrofoam cups, etc, are all readily available as are the tools to form them.  Each material has its own personality.  But, like blind dates, personality only goes so far.

I tend to gravitate toward repurposing materials that are imbued with some sort of emotion, and to use them in large multiples.  I also look for materials that are available where I work and low-cost.  Here’s a diagram to illustrate what I mean:

So, now I’m off to find 10,000 small-arms ammunition casings.  Any ideas?