Casting away!

It's been a busy week of making plaster casts for upcoming paintings. There are more sessions coming later this week and even more as soon as I get a new case of plaster bandage in. Many of these are in preparation for some upcoming shows.

I have a solo show slated for July/August at Zeitgeist gallery in Pittsfield and Helen Wassell and I have two joint shows planned there - Facing 50 and Fear Gone.

My own show is going to be a continuation of the current Passages collection (I've yet to think of a show title). I want to show a wider range of interactions and situations of an everyday level, and then work the series toward progressively transcendent themes.

Facing 50 is Helen's concept, basically showing cultural influences she's experienced in her 50 years of life so far. She at least wanted a few casts of her face, one for each era of her life, but now we're tossing around the idea of 50 faces, one for each year.

Fear Gone is a more involved installation / art combo show, chronicling her experiences with esophageal cancer.

So far this week, I've made casts of my partner, Wendy, my parents and Helen.


Wendy getting plastered.


Mom, Sophia Wessel.

Assembly stage

Started working on assembling the new painting. When I made the casts of my father's hands, I had to do the insides of his palms separately so he could get out. Now I had to put them together with extra gauze. It looks like the painting will do best at about 2 x 4 ft. I just happened to have a piece of canvas about that size and it was easy to do a trial layout of the pieces since that's also the size of my work table.

The lower entity is actually a cast of my own face and represents someone seeking guidance. The upper one (a cast of my dad) represents a guiding spirit. I've made the stretcher and will let the glue harden overnight.

In the meantime, I worked a little more on the painting with FL's cast. Since it's about letting go of past allegiances for those that are more suitable, it needed the face of the one being let go. It's a highly modified cast of my own face that I'd removed from the original version of Stellar Flame. I had padded the cheeks and nose of that one to create a slightly different face, but these remnants work well for that purpose.

I also have the sculpting stage of Joy Shared to finish. Need lots more faces for that one.

It's pretty cold down in the basement with the weather so cold outside. Even with the wood stove going, it only gets up to about 50°. It slows down the drying process. So I'll let things sit overnight.

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Beginning a new series

Since March I've had a new series of paintings brewing in my head. It's one of those not directly related inspirations that took hold while bringing a design class to see the work of sculptor James Kitchen. It was this piece in particular that sparked a flood of images in my mind of spirit guides helping their charges.

There are several images that I can picture very strongly, but I've yet to start sketching. I started making casts for one last week. My Dad was happy to pose for the part of the shaman / guide spirit and it was an honor to make casts of him. He also has the humor and patience that makes for a good cast model!

I hope to do more as soon as the weather evens out and travel up to their house gets better. Mom was more than happy to take pictures.


Dad had fun pretending he had two broken arms. These are going to be used to cup around the head of another person in the painting, imbuing energy.

While I was working on his face, I noticed the interesting qualities of his clasped hands and had to get them ... not sure where they fit into an image yet, but they were too cool to leave.


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Sketches and Plans

Did a host of rough sketches for children's book ideas after tossing ideas for TV shows around with Helen. Some of these have been living in my head for years (one of them for decades). I'll have to scan them next week when work slows down.

I'm also hoping to convince my Dad to let me make plaster casts of his hands when we go up to visit for Thanksgiving. I've wanted several sets of larger, older hands for paintings I've had in my head since April. No telling what he'll say. He has some pretty severe dry skin problems on his hands sometimes, but the process will probably make them feel better.

No sketches on that series of paintings yet. They've been evolving in my subconscious. When I start to sink into sleepiness, like now, they become clearer in my mind and refine themselves just a little every time. It's a series of "guiding spirit" paintings where the older, wiser being is gently holding the head of a less sure, floundering soul. It's a somewhat shamanistic feeling they're giving me.

Sketches of those need to happen soon before they fade.

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