Strong Like Water--Click For Full-Size!

So, this thing is wrapping itself up sooner than I thought, mostly because it's about to hit two tons, and 4500 lbs is about my limit for a self-financed project. It's 9 feet tall, about 22 feet long and 8 feet 2 inches wide at the base (the lumber splays out in front a little past 9 feet)

It's truly safe now, what with all that weight holding the lumber together. In fact, it's amazing solid it is. You could play on it all day, and so could your friends.

I've got about thirty tires left to add, and might get ten or fifteen more if I want to make something look a little more full here or there. But I really can't add more or it becomes a chore to lift. It's basically going to look like this.

I'ts got some nice passages. The rhythm of the lines becomes kind of entrancing. Even though I told myself that I would never work with tires again, I am really inspired to do something much, much larger along these lines. A forest of 12"x12" timbers (the orange-and-white striped kind they use when they work on the street) with a tire forest floor the size of a soccer field. Wouldn't that just be magical?

The plan is to finish it up in the next day or two, spend a little time cutting screws and doing other detail work. Then the real fun starts. We are going to put it on dollys and drag it outside with a big truck, give it a good scrubbing, and start practicing the lift!

Structurally, it's a two-ton futon full of sticks. The rigging will be very interesting, and this time I am basically on my own. Mark diSuvero's guys are not here to save me from my ignorance.

Wish me luck, and look forward to lots and lots of rigging pictures!

Comments

[Michael Konrad]

Yes! Can't wait for the rigging pictures.

What are you using to hold the tires together? And are the railroad ties held in place by anything other than the tires wrapping around them? I'd be worried about them slipping or moving out of place while being lifted. From looking at it, I'd guess if the entire sculpture isn't supported from underneath by the riggers, it will flop around making it difficult to move.

Good luck, I'm sure you'll manage.

[paula]

i too look forward to more photos.
i've been studying this...that last picture really lets you feel like you are IN it. It gave me the feeling of lava...of the world sinking and drowning in its own pollution
layer after layer eating up the sticks of mankind.
interesting stuff deborah

[oriane stender]

Hi Deborah,

I like this. This may sound corny, but I like the feeling of yin/yang, soft/hard, feminine/masculine it gives. The layered skins of the tires bring some of Tara Donovan's work to mind (did you ever see her huge floppy spirals/spools of adding machine paper?), while the posts are very forceful and DiSuveroesque. I like that you can take a hard macho material like old tires and make it into the comparatively soft, lacy element by the way you work with it and by juxtaposing it with an even harder, more rigid material. And yet, wood, by it's nature, also has a soft side (it's alive, it's a plant, it grows and changes). So you've got two substances whose materiality, or presence, or essence, kind of shift back and forth between the roles of root/anchor and meandering line/leafy foliage. It's very metaphorically pleasing.

I hope I didn't totally alienate you with my comments at Ed's. And I'm not trying to make up for it by making nice here. I really do like your work.

Oriane

[21st Century Plowshare]

Hey Oriane,
Blogs are for arguing, and sometimes arguing goes weird places. I'm letting all that Winkleman business go, no hard feelings.

Thanks for the kind words, folks.

Michael, do you want me to explain the rigging, or would that ruin the pictures that will be coming soon? ;)

[Michael Konrad]

Well, if the pictures are coming soon, I think I can wait!