7 posts tagged “chicken”

This is the second Shawn/Rooster combo. The prior piece was my first Centaur Chicken, and sold almost immediately. It now lives in England. This one has some additions; the comb & wattle, and spurs. The prior piece joined the legs to the bird at the knees, while this one goes all the way to the hips- it stands at nearly 4 feet tall. All-thread runs the length of the legs and bolts to the underside of the base. The plaster sub-base was poured in place to ensure stability. I used Hydrostone, a new-to-me kind of high bond plaster backed with hemp- and it is much stronger than my previous Hydrocal/burlap/bandage figures
The base color is established, but still needs patination, while the wood base needs wire-wooled and another coat of stain- but this is as far as it will go for quite awhile as I am heading back to Montana this weekend. I'll bring the laptop and post some Cowboy images when I head in to town.

As long as I was revisiting work from the summer, I couldn't forget the Centaur Chicken! This is CentauE, holding her egg on her shoulder- now in a nice Bronze color. Now I really need to create a better base for her- without snapping a leg off.

I just sold the mate to this little piece to a buyer in Salt Lake City, Utah. This is derived from my "Gallus Gallus" commission for the Draper Public Library in Draper, Utah- to see more on the chicken and egg theme visit my website at www.dangerhart.com, and scroll down to public commissions. 

This will be the last Centaur Chicken I create for a bit. I have a few more in mind, but I have some new ideas going in a different direction. The Centaur figures have answered many technical concerns, laying a solid groundwork for media use. I will still be playing with existing molds of figures, but allowing the figure to act as a stepping off point for exploration.
The centaur figures don't require the kind of creative attention and originality that generates a genuine motivation. By this I mean that they are a pre-existent idea that require a skilled process to create, but the process of creation does not significantly inform them or lead anywhere new: I know which figure and chicken will fuse well, which parts I'm putting where, and how it will turn out.  There is no risk of failure, no invention of necessity, no real interaction necessary- in other words, they are boring me. A good direction leads into the unknown and has inherent failures- risk and exploration inspire new ideas and new directions.

This piece is in a private collection. It is the first Centaur Chicken- Gallus Porter or Cock Man, as it's owner refers to it.I created this piece after a long period of plaster trial and error in the fall of 06. I finally reached a predicable/stable result with the straight figure.  Shifting this technique to the demands of the centaur chicken was a big test/risk of the plaster technique, as the torso creates an enormous cantilever of stress on the legs. I didn't think it would work, and so was happily surprised with its structural integrity.