Snow Sculpture from the Vermont State Snow Sculpting Champions

Possible?

So we have kicking a bunch of ideas around as to what to make for 2010 US Nationals. The deadline is looming, so our heavy regular schedule of procrastination, laziness and other lifely duties has really been paying off for us – in reverse.

This could be something. I had the idea of a guy with a home-made jet pack and things going wrong, so we whipped up this model to see how it might look. His kid is there too – with a remote – becuase if you are going to build a jet pack you should trust your 9 year old with the remote controller. And I through that little doggie in there too because every sculpture should have a dog. (It’s a great photo opportunity when real dogs come up to it).

Adrian has some other ideas so we need to do rock-paper-scissors (or the snow sculpting equivalent, which is saw-scraper-chisel. (chisel smashes scraper, saw covers chisel, scraper cuts your fingers – so be careful when choosing that one.)

So maybe this will never get made into a real sculpture of maybe it will be tweaked to the point of near-recognition – we just don’t know yet! I am open to the possibilities that we haven’t thought of yet!

So – Here is the latest greatest version. With less then two weeks before be head out to Colorado to make it. I think it is showing signs of being awesome – and seeing it in this small form we are better able to imagine how to create it from the 20 ton block of snow that we will be faced with.

Model. Getting there.

Originally uploaded by Vermont Snow Sculpture Pic Account

Here is the model as of today. Still needs a bit of toning – but the gist os all there.

We sat around the table and worked on the model and pretty much nailed it last night. I took a pic, but my phone seems to have lost it, but I need to get a better camera working on that anyway. We fit the whole thing – for the most part – inside the block, so while there will be little reconstruction of outside the block snow elements, there is still now the matter of dealing with the more then 1/3 of the sculpture that we need to demolish before we even start making something.

It is a lot of snow to move – many of the pros design to use as much as the block as possible – but we are not pros. 

We listen to some pretty spacey music when we make models, which reflects in the title of the post. Hearts of Space is a great NPR show – but after talking about it and thinking about the model I started thinking of how much of sculpture is really just space – and the hearts of the space is what makes the heart of the matter strong. 

I got the video camera. I got the 54″ floor scrapes. We think we have some good raffle prizes coming – stay tuned.

Dealing with scale when making the model does not involde weighing it. It involves making objects bigger and smaller. The whole idea is that we are making a scale model – one inch on the model equals one foot on the snow block – so we have to fit it into “the box”. We talk about “the box” alot – and not oddly enough, we are making the model in Brooke’s studio – which is called “the box”.

So we have to make one of the parts bigger. I think we solved the issue of the model falling over all the time by building the supports into the model making. We’ll see how that goes!

Well – here is my cell phone pic of the first draft of the model. We got togther at Brooke’s studio and sat around the table drinking beers and listening to The Radiator – Burlington’s local radio – which inspired us to no end. The model is hard to work with because – well – the guy is sort of floating – so he kept on falling over. Clay in general doesn’t really hold up to what we put through – but we got a good start and that is what we were after.

So – Snow Sculpture is mostly about the artistic process – so I thought it would be cool to detail the process as best I could in this dealio.

Many people ask us where we get the ideas from. Usually its Adrian, Brooke and I just bouncing ideas off each other. Last year in Breckenridge one of our lliasons, Emily, was hanging out rooting us on and asked us that very question. So we told her, but we also asked her what she thought would make a good snow sculpture. She responded with “A person getting blown by the wind.”

Adrian and I both lit right up – “Hey – that is a good idea…” 

The next submission we needed was Breck ’09 – so we talked about what to include in the sketch.

Then Adrian and Brooke drove up from Beantown together and they met me at the Flatbreads and this sketch was pretty much done – Adrian finalized it last time he and the fam were up and we were having coffee.

I then scanned it, took it apart and manipulated it slightly, raising the guy up in the air a bit in the front. I believe once we start the modeling phase the dynamics will insist on him being higher in the front… but we’ll see…  

So that’s how it starts. We need to make a model now – a scale model (1 inch on the sculpture equals 1 foot on the model) – and then see how it changes from the sketch. We are supposed to stay pretty close! But again… we’ll see…