New Bronze Sculpture | Part Three
The molds containing cooling molten bronze had to solidify before I could free my pieces. I took off my heat suit, spit on the still glowing bronze to imbed some DNA in my sculpture, and waited. Pour day was the coolest day in weeks, a blessing for those in the heavy heat suits pouring bronze. Also a blessing because I got to crack open my mold the same day I poured.
I rolled the mold across the ground to an open area where I could take an ax to it. I hacked a line down the side, cutting through the chicken wire and plaster, wiggling the ax side to side in the crack to get the mold to release. The bronze clattered onto cement, freed, still very hot and covered with plaster remnant. I dropped it with tongs into a bucket of water to clean, a cloud of steam rising up, the very hot metal turned the cold water into warm water. I repeated the process with my second piece, then sprayed off remaining debris before extracting it from the bath and leaving it to cool further. Bronze pulled fresh out of a mold looks like a disaster, like twisting channels with no shape. It is so wonderful, though, because buried in the gating is my figure, waiting to be refined to beauty.
I returned to the art room the next day to use a chop saw and a circular saw to cut away the excess bronze from the figure of a face. At some points the bronze would easily give to the cutting, at other points it would fight, shorting out my hand saw from the effort. I was decked out it a thick jacket, gloves, face shield, and ear muffs to protect from flying shards of hot bronze and the sound of metal cutting metal.
It was a puzzle of deciding where to cut and how to make cuts work together to free the figure with as little pain as possible. The tedious process took three hours, and that was just to get off all the large pieces of excess bronze. Then, I took a dremel to all the blemishes where bronze had been cut to grind down the final bits of excess, removing all traces of gating I had affixed to the face. Dremels are so fun to use. I shredded a few file tips, the bronze attempting to hold its strength against all forces. Finally, my pieces were restored to the form I originally sculpted in wax. It went through the dirt, through the fire, and was finally resting in all the bronze glory it could posses.
I finished my sculpture, I finished and again marveled at the thin space I enter with making bronze pieces. I always think about how it must reflect the Creators feelings, the effort of making something only to watch it perch the cusp of destruction. Sometimes it gives way to destruction. Other times, with a guiding hand and grace, the creation enters a season of growth and transformation resulting in newness, the fire and grime not forgotten but rather crucial to the end result.
