From !!!bmyers@ionet.net Mon Aug 03 04:23:54 1998
Newsgroups: alt.slack
Subject: Re: Weasels Ripped My Flesh
From: !!!bmyers@ionet.net (TarlaStar)
Date: Mon, 03 Aug 1998 11:23:54 GMT
"Rev. Random the Other" <cmcjp02@nt.com> wrote:
<snip great rant and start of interesting story>
>In the McDonalds. I don't frequent fast
>food places, and still have not recovered from my last visit to
>Arbys, but I had to take a shit. Inside, a glass display case with
>an original Fredric Remington bronze. Original edition, not a lost
>wax reproduction, tho there is not a thing wrong with the repro's.
>Original Remington. In Smithfield, in the McDonalds. SLACK!
Just a couple of points here, Rev. 1) most bronzes are made using the
"lost wax" method. The original run from the original molds were also
made with lost wax. (I'd be happy to describe the entire process, if
you like.) Later runs would have been made from molds taken from the
first run bronzes instead of the actual clay piece. 2) I'm also
curious to know how you could tell that it was from the original run
if it was inside a display case?
From bbombere@erols.com Mon Aug 03 09:28:56 1998
Newsgroups: alt.slack
Subject: Re: Weasels Ripped My Flesh
From: "=?iso-8859-1?Q?K=F6nig=20Preu=DFe?=, GmbH" <bbombere@erols.com>
Date: Mon, 03 Aug 1998 12:28:56 -0400
TarlaStar wrote:
> "Rev. Random the Other" <cmcjp02@nt.com> wrote:
> <snip great rant and start of interesting story>
>
> >In the McDonalds. I don't frequent fast
> >food places, and still have not recovered from my last visit to
> >Arbys, but I had to take a shit. Inside, a glass display case with
> >an original Fredric Remington bronze. Original edition, not a lost
> >wax reproduction, tho there is not a thing wrong with the repro's.
> >Original Remington. In Smithfield, in the McDonalds. SLACK!
>
> Just a couple of points here, Rev. 1) most bronzes are made using the
> "lost wax" method. The original run from the original molds were also
> made with lost wax. (I'd be happy to describe the entire process, if
> you like.) Later runs would have been made from molds taken from the
> first run bronzes instead of the actual clay piece. 2) I'm also
> curious to know how you could tell that it was from the original run
> if it was inside a display case?
Where do you find lost wax?
From charliec@cybernex.net Tue Aug 04 03:16:31 1998
Newsgroups: alt.slack
Subject: Re: Weasels Ripped My Flesh
From: TheCharlie <charliec@cybernex.net>
Date: Tue, 4 Aug 1998 10:16:31 GMT
König Preuße, GmbH wrote:
>
> TarlaStar wrote:
>
> > "Rev. Random the Other" <cmcjp02@nt.com> wrote:
> > <snip great rant and start of interesting story>
> >
> > >In the McDonalds. I don't frequent fast
> > >food places, and still have not recovered from my last visit to
> > >Arbys, but I had to take a shit. Inside, a glass display case with
> > >an original Fredric Remington bronze. Original edition, not a lost
> > >wax reproduction, tho there is not a thing wrong with the repro's.
> > >Original Remington. In Smithfield, in the McDonalds. SLACK!
> >
> > Just a couple of points here, Rev. 1) most bronzes are made using the
> > "lost wax" method. The original run from the original molds were also
> > made with lost wax. (I'd be happy to describe the entire process, if
> > you like.) Later runs would have been made from molds taken from the
> > first run bronzes instead of the actual clay piece. 2) I'm also
> > curious to know how you could tell that it was from the original run
> > if it was inside a display case?
>
> Where do you find lost wax?
You don't, dummy.. that's why they call it 'lost' ..
From reverand@mindspring.com Wed Aug 05 10:31:53 1998
Newsgroups: alt.slack
Subject: Re: Weasels Ripped My Flesh
From: reverand@mindspring.com (Rev. Random the Other)
Date: Wed, 05 Aug 1998 17:31:53 GMT
!!!bmyers@ionet.net (TarlaStar) wrote:
>"Rev. Random the Other" <cmcjp02@nt.com> wrote:
>>Original Remington. In Smithfield, in the McDonalds. SLACK!
>
>Just a couple of points here, Rev. 1) most bronzes are made using the
>"lost wax" method. The original run from the original molds were also
>made with lost wax. (I'd be happy to describe the entire process, if
>you like.) Later runs would have been made from molds taken from the
>first run bronzes instead of the actual clay piece. 2) I'm also
>curious to know how you could tell that it was from the original run
>if it was inside a display case?
2) Yeah, I asked myself that same question in a big long paragraph
that I cut from the story. I mean, that are the credentials needed for
a curatorship at a McDonalds? Is a program offered at Ronald U?
Is it a rigorous program, and do they have access to the latest
verification technologies? Or what if they decided to put such
knowledge to evil purposes, to counterfeit, perhaps using acetylene to
alter the signature on a mere reproduction?
I wrote how the display case was actually glass and polished oak, the
centerpiece of the museum. The original franchise owner was some
nutcase redneck collector, collecting objects "from 1879-1909". The
objects, or the collecting? It wasn't clear. I talked about the
fifteen thousand dollar security system, with alarms and laser beams
and two video cameras dedicated to the display case, with a third, at
least, hidden somewhere behind me, judging from the way the hair on my
neck was reacting. I talked about Pulling the Wool. Is my belief in
the veracity of the sculpture in the Chicago museum on any sounder
ground? My thoughts were bouncing around all over everywhere, which is
why I cut it. I won't try to reproduce it now, because I'm on break
and gotta run, and because I'm too excited about 1). All I know is
that behind that perfectly undistinguished McDonalds facad, there was
an art museum on the very DAY that I needed such a Slacklift. Whoda
thunk it.
1) I'd be WAY interested in the details. Pammy and me were talking
about how little we knew about the subject just two weeks ago. My
cluelessness is embarasing. You gonna have to go REAL slow.
I've always heard "Lost Wax Reproduction" used as a phrase, kinda like
"Ethnic Albanians". This is gonna be great.
What little background I have is limited to working with a steel
foundry; sandcasting using the "Lost Styrafoam" method, I guess. I
don't expect that Wax could stand up to the sand pounding...I can also
work the phase-change diagrams; spectify the needs in terms of
strength and surface/depth hardness (or specify the acceptable
deformation under load) and eventually I can work out the %
carbon/alloy, the heating and quenching cycles and hold times needed
to achieve the required characteristics. Oh, and what material is
needed for the quench (Did I say liquid sodium? Opps, I meant lead.)
Martinsite, pearlite, ferrite. I grew up in Mill Country. US steel,
Inland Steel. Bethleham. Rolling mill, Sheet mill, Bar mill. You'd
think I would have some foggy clue as to bronze art, but nope.
So my questions are many:
1) Let's start with the actual original work. Neither Pam nor me knew
how the original was done. Does one start with a big block of bronze
and cut away everything that doesn't look like the statue? What tool
is used to do this? Yes, THAT dumb. You mentioned "The actual clay
piece." I suspect that this answers it.
2) Then a mold is made for a limited run. What material is the mold
made from? What material WAS it made from before, say, Stainless was
around? Or whatever.
2a) How is this done? The making of the mold? How is it formed
around the intricate bits, like the guns in the air in the Remington?
No sand pounding, right? Are there seams in the final product that
need to be sanded down?
3) Ok, we got a mold. It can be reused. Does it split in half? Do the
lines of the original blur with successive copies? What does it look
like, physically?
4) Does the sculptor need to determine the phase state characteristics
of the bronze prior to starting? Do you decide that it needs to have a
certain toughness and strength characteristics, and so know what alloy
is needed? Or is bronze work re-fired afterwords, or is this even
needed? Is bronze a standard percentage alloy, always the same? No
wait, there is tin bronze, aluminum bronze, and silicon bronze, so no,
it's not standard. Does the sculptor specify up front what alloy is
needed?
5) Does the sculptor make the alloy at the time of the pour? What kind
of foundry would a Remington or a Rodin have used? What is used in a
modern studio? What does it look like, how is it fueled? How was it
fueled in Rodin's time?
6) OK, got a mold, poured and perhaps annealed. The Original. Err, I
missed where the wax comes in. Heedless, Ok, I got an original and the
sculptor has destroyed the mold then died. I gathered that one takes
an original and builds a new mold, but HOW? Worse, how do they make a
scaled down/up replica?
You said that the Original Run was also made with Lost Wax, so I'm
thinking that the process must differ from my "Lost Styrafoam", used
to make only the mold. The hot steel vaporizes the styro and fills the
space left.
I got even more questions, but gotta get back to benches. You got
yourself TWO genuinely interested students out here in Griptionville.
Rev. Random the Other
sitting crosslegged at Tarla's feet
Ow! FUCK! OwOwOwOw!
Fucking knee still hurts
How 'bout if I just slouch on the couch?
From !!!bmyers@ionet.net Thu Aug 06 04:03:43 1998
Newsgroups: alt.slack
Subject: Re: Weasels Ripped My Flesh
From: !!!bmyers@ionet.net (TarlaStar)
Date: Thu, 06 Aug 1998 11:03:43 GMT
reverand@mindspring.com (Rev. Random the Other) wrote:
<snip description of security measures that were probably more
valuable than the sculpture itself>
>1) I'd be WAY interested in the details. Pammy and me were talking
>about how little we knew about the subject just two weeks ago. My
>cluelessness is embarasing. You gonna have to go REAL slow.
>I've always heard "Lost Wax Reproduction" used as a phrase, kinda like
>"Ethnic Albanians". This is gonna be great.
>What little background I have is limited to working with a steel
>foundry; sandcasting using the "Lost Styrafoam" method, I guess. I
>don't expect that Wax could stand up to the sand pounding...I can also
>work the phase-change diagrams; spectify the needs in terms of
>strength and surface/depth hardness (or specify the acceptable
>deformation under load) and eventually I can work out the %
>carbon/alloy, the heating and quenching cycles and hold times needed
>to achieve the required characteristics. Oh, and what material is
>needed for the quench (Did I say liquid sodium? Opps, I meant lead.)
>Martinsite, pearlite, ferrite. I grew up in Mill Country. US steel,
>Inland Steel. Bethleham. Rolling mill, Sheet mill, Bar mill. You'd
>think I would have some foggy clue as to bronze art, but nope.
>So my questions are many:
>1) Let's start with the actual original work. Neither Pam nor me knew
>how the original was done. Does one start with a big block of bronze
>and cut away everything that doesn't look like the statue? What tool
>is used to do this? Yes, THAT dumb. You mentioned "The actual clay
>piece." I suspect that this answers it.
You create a strong armature (the skeleton) then pack the clay on. I
use an oil based clay (Roma Plastalina) because it's firmer. I suspect
that Remington did too. I know that Daniel Chester French did. After
you get the clay just the way you want it, you create a mold. In
Ancient times, you made a waste mold, which meant that there would
only be ONE copy. Nowadays, you make a rubber/plaster mold. Remington
probably used alginate molds. Silicone molds are made by mixing two
elements together (very toxic and hard on the lungs, we wear
respirators in the studio when making them.) and brushing/pouring the
liquid rubber onto the original statue. We make two print coats before
adding the little plastic bubbles that define the borders of the mold
sides. (Visualize: you got this head, say, covered in green rubber,
now, you have to get the mold apart, so it has to have two sides. We
take these strips of square plastic (about two inches on a side) that
have a little bubble pushed out on one side. These are the keys that
let us know how the rubber is supposed to fit back together once we
cut it.) The keys are also covered in a layer of silicone. Now we're
ready for the plaster and hemp.
We take bales of hemp fibres and make little "nests" of hemp about as
big in diameter as your spread-open hand. Then we make a bucket of
moulding plaster and dump a bunch of nests into it. With the plaster
soaked nests, we make a hard shell for the silicone mold. Since the
keys are in place, the plaster part of the mold has a nice clear edge
for us to drill through when the time comes. The plaster mold is
removed from the silicon/clay statue, and we slice through the rubber
around the keys, down through the print coats and GENTLY remove the
silicone. Now it can be placed into the plaster "mother mold" and sent
to the foundry. (The mother mold is held together with long bolts or
screws in holes around those edges that you make, while the piece is
still on the statue.)
When the mother mold gets to the foundry, they have "wax artists" who
pour/paint microcrystaline wax into the silicone mold and right back
out again (so that you get a hollow wax positive). Vents are added to
the wax form so that later, the gases and steam can escape. The wax
positive should be a very clean finished version of the original.
The wax is then taken to a part of the foundry where they dip it into
a liquid ceramic and then while the ceramic is still wet, into an
aerated sand pit. It goes back and forth into the ceramic and sand
until a hard candy shell is built up around the wax (both inside and
out). Now it's ready to receive bronze.
The bronze is poured into the ceramic shell. The wax is immediately
dissolved, the gases and steam escaping through the vents. Bronze
fills every space where there once was was (thus: lost wax). You now
have a hollow bronze version of your original clay.
>2) Then a mold is made for a limited run. What material is the mold
>made from? What material WAS it made from before, say, Stainless was
>around? Or whatever.
You must repeat the wax through ceramic shell process for every statue
in the run. The mother mold will hold up as long as you treat it well.
Molds have been made from ceramic for at least a hundred years.
> 2a) How is this done? The making of the mold? How is it formed
>around the intricate bits, like the guns in the air in the Remington?
>No sand pounding, right? Are there seams in the final product that
>need to be sanded down?
Depending upon how big a crucible your foundry has, you will have
anywhere from two to two hundred pieces that have to be welded back
together. I don't know much about this process of chasing and welding,
but I do know that TIG and MIG welders are used. The chasers are
specialists in their own right.
>3) Ok, we got a mold. It can be reused. Does it split in half? Do the
>lines of the original blur with successive copies? What does it look
>like, physically?
Yes, yes, no unless you're taking a mold from a bronze instead of the
original source material. It looks like a big plaster pod.
>4) Does the sculptor need to determine the phase state characteristics
>of the bronze prior to starting? Do you decide that it needs to have a
>certain toughness and strength characteristics, and so know what alloy
>is needed?
No, the only thing you have to think about as a sculptor (and many
don't have a clue that they SHOULD be thinking about this) is: how
easy is this going to be to mold and cast? Pieces that hang off a
sculpture, outstretched arms etc. all have to be cut off the piece and
molded separately. Then they have to be welded back on in the end.
This is a hassle for everyone concerned...except the sculptor. Since I
understand the process, most of my work is very "tight", meaning there
aren't a whole lot of deep gaps, or extending parts. Everything grows
out of everything else.
> Or is bronze work re-fired afterwords, or is this even
>needed? Is bronze a standard percentage alloy, always the same? No
>wait, there is tin bronze, aluminum bronze, and silicon bronze, so no,
>it's not standard. Does the sculptor specify up front what alloy is
>needed?
Not usually. They leave that up to the foundry. Hell, Random, most
sculptors don't even know how to enlarge their own work. The foundries
usually employ enlargement artists to do that for them.
>5) Does the sculptor make the alloy at the time of the pour? What kind
>of foundry would a Remington or a Rodin have used? What is used in a
>modern studio? What does it look like, how is it fueled? How was it
>fueled in Rodin's time?
I'm not sure about Remington's foundry (but I can find out) however,
I've seen photos of the foundry that Rodin used. There was a family of
Frenchmen that had a wonderful foundry in Paris. Rodin used them
exclusively. It was fueled by coal in Rodin's time and most modern
foundries are gas fueled.
>6) OK, got a mold, poured and perhaps annealed. The Original. Err, I
>missed where the wax comes in. Heedless, Ok, I got an original and the
>sculptor has destroyed the mold then died. I gathered that one takes
>an original and builds a new mold, but HOW? Worse, how do they make a
>scaled down/up replica?
Okay, the original clay has been destroyed...but you have a bronze
from the first run. Now you just do the same thing to that bronze that
you did to the original clay: make a silicone/plaster mold. However,
because bronze isn't going to be quite as sharp as the clay was in
detail, a good eye will be able to tell the difference between the
first run bronzes, and subsequent bronzes that have been taken from
another bronze.
Enlargement and reduction are sorta easy and sorta complex.
When you make your original statue, you usually do so on a wooden base
of some sort. The armature is attached to this etc. When you get ready
to enlarge something, you draw a grid on your wooden base, numbering
it on one side and alphabetizing it on the other. Now you have the
ability to locate any part of the statue according to its position in
two directions. If you measure it from the wooden base to its height
above the base, you have three directions. That's all you need.
Let's make it simple (for me). You have a statue that is 2' tall. You
want it to be 6' tall. So you have an expansion ratio of 3:1. If, on
the small version, your wrist joint is located at A/6/3" (using the
grid, a plumb bob and a bubble level) then you will want to place the
wrist joint of your enlarged armature at A/6/9" and so on. If you
place all the joints of your figure in the exact position that they
were on in the small version, you should be able to reproduce the
figure in its larger version. In the small version we use aluminum
wire and 1/2" plumbing pipe for the armature. In the large version we
use 4" steel pipes and rebar.
>You said that the Original Run was also made with Lost Wax, so I'm
>thinking that the process must differ from my "Lost Styrafoam", used
>to make only the mold. The hot steel vaporizes the styro and fills the
>space left.
Same basic idea.
*****
It is by caffeine alone I set my mind in motion, it is by the
beans of Java, that the thoughts acquire speed, the hands
aquire shaking, the shaking becomes a warning. It is by
caffeine alone I set my mind in motion."
*****Rev. Mutha Tarla Star*****