Busy year 2013

It been a long time since i updated my blog as I have been so busy this year. Things are slowing down, which is sort of good as it is just getting colder, and for all those people that work outside lets hope its not as harsh and lengthy a winter as last year! I have done lots of house restoration work this year. The most extreme transformation is this house in Easton, Bristol, which is possibly the worst I have seen still standing!
Before..

 And after

 

I also attended the Bristol festival of stone as an exhibitor, carving a very big salmon. I carved a prototype to see if it would work before attempting the larger sculpture out of a block of Portland.

Bath stone mini fish..

The larger fish is still a work in progress, which I am hoping to complete over the winter as the work is tailing off, hopefully next to a heat source of some sort. This is my most recent picture of it.

And below the still, *sigh* unfinished fish in progress stop motion film, this film is about 3 weeks worth of work.

Had a great day last Friday in a carve off competition with two french sculptors, with plenty of music, and cider. The sun came out and the rain mostly stayed away. It was a pre-launch for a huge event next summer - Festival of stone Bristol 2013 which will involve 50 or more sculptors.

The venue was Spike Island, Bristol. Both teams started with a piece of stone 400 x400 x 600 kindly supplied by Phidias Neo-classical Ltd.

I had the privilege of being partnered with Ben Dearnely (above) who produced the carving of the Mark Foster torso now sited in Southgate, Bath.

We shared the block of stone and Ben carved the man, myself the woman, on the theme of  'Amour'.

Time was limited, we had only six hours, and sketched out our design on the way over from Bath, so all in all it was a success.

 Congrats to both teams, many thanks to all the people who gave up their time to make the day a success and for providing some lovely food, and oodles of beer and cider. And thanks to the accordion player who kept us going!

Started carving my first ever breasts in stone today. Over all my years of being a stone mason and carver I have never had the pleasure, and by God, its harder than you would think. I cant draw to save my life, so attending a life drawing class to improve my skill would be fruitless, also I think I am probably too immature to cope, and would either gawk like a pubescent boy, or get an inappropriate uncontrollable fit of giggles. Or knowing my luck it would be the turn of the fat ugly bloke that week to pose. I have a pair of my own, but they are no longer as pert or athlectic as I need for a model. The breasts in question are not only pert and petit, but small, really small, as you can see in the picture.

I will post updates on my progress and the finished girl if everything goes according to plan. For more examples of my work see my website.