Wednesday, November 29, 2017

17P-8 (November 29)

The tide window opened today. Low of 1 foot at 12:19. It would be even better the next day, so I decided to go take a look at the sand. Given how bad it was the last two times, I wanted to have some idea of what to expect.

I took nothing but keys. Walked over the hill and down to the beach, then south. Currents and waves, along with growing tides as the full moon approaches, have caused erosion of the beach south of Ocean Park. There's a four-foot-tall bank in places.

The day was calm and cool. Sunlight through high thin clouds. Water clear, surf moderate. At times there were scatters of pebbles, and I picked up a few and put them into pockets. I didn't expect any sculpture so wouldn't have to worry about sitting on them.

The south side of the isthmus had a top layer of fine sand, along with shells, sand dollars, fragments and pebbles. I dug some sample pits. The sand was finer than what I'd used for the last sculpture, but there were the usual rough items. Moving east made it worse so I tried farther west than I normally go. Here I found, under about 5 inches of decent sand with shells, a thick layer of fine clean sand.

I'm not dressed for it, not prepared for it, but there are some mussel shells for carving. Fine sand is a gift. Accept it while it's there.
   
Build number: 17P-8 (monolith with extension and earthworks)
Title: none
Date: November 29
Location: Venice Breakwater, south side littoral, closer to breakwater than usual
Start: 11:30, construction time approx. 2 hours
Size: about 24 inches tall, base roughly 22 inches across
Digital Images: none. No camera brought
New Tools: none
New Equipment: none

The sand I built with wasn't completely clean. As the borrow pit became wider the sides fell in, but I could dilute that sand with the better sand from underneath. I wasn't equipped for overburden removal.

The pile was good but variable. Layers made after some side wall fell in were rougher. Layers made from the fine sand were good.

Carving was done with mussel shells and hands for the deep spaces. The top part had a strong lean to the north which I trimmed a bit to balance. There were spaces underneath that, and a big hollow through the lower center.

I shaped earthworks to go with that. On the west I added a long ridge sloping up to the sculpture's end. On the east the earthworks were separate, and wrapped around, with my handprints on the south end.

It worked out well. Some nice details that fitted with each other. Shaped mostly by hand after rough carving with the shells. it was a much more fun piece to work on than 17P-7 with all those rocks.

I wish I'd had a camera. Not just for the sculpture, either, as the way the beach had eroded left beautiful patterns behind.

Santa Monica
2017 November 29

Monday, November 20, 2017

17P-7 (November 20)

The tide window was still open. I hoped for improvement in the sand but I had my choice of a higher place with coarser sand or a lower place with many tiny clams. I chose the higher site.

The coarse sand required very fast piling, so I could get the next layer on before the lower ones became too dry. That's why this piece is tall and narrow. The result was soft, with softer places and many shells, pebbles and fragments.

I was already mentally scattered, and had a hard time focusing on anything. Even the earthworks were mostly an afterthought, with little real design applied.

I'd thought about bringing a form so I could screen the sand. I should have. I'm tired of the rough material getting into the way, but as one observer said "That makes for good surface texture." True, but frustrating when one wants to carve details.

The sculpture is about 28 inches tall.

The lighting was strange. Thin high clouds that varied. I shot with cloudy white balance, which sometimes worked and other timed didn't. I probably would have been better off shooting with daylight balance and correcting later, as removing excess blue seems to be easier than correcting excess red.










Friday, November 10, 2017

Jewels Underfoot III: British Columbia

In 1995 I entered my first sand sculpture contest, and won it. On the strength of that I applied to the World Championships in Harrison Hot Springs, British Columbia, for 1996 and was accepted.

A friend of mine happened to be there and picked up a sample of the sand so I could find out in advance what I'd be working with. The news wasn't all that good.

Sand from Harrison Hot Springs, BC, collected by Bert Adams
Click on the image see it full size

Harrison Hot Springs is on the south shore of Harrison Lake. What is missing from the sand sample is the silt that is mixed with the sand on the beach. Ocean sand doesn't contain silt because of the wave action. Waves agitate and currents move the silt to calmer areas; the sand remains.

Silt mixed with sand is actually a good thing because it fills the gaps between sand grains and holds everything together. Think of the rammed earth of China's Great Wall that has stood for a thousand years.

The problem I ran into was that in filtering out the roots and other detritus, I separated the silt from the sand and ended up with a weaker pile. My first attempt fell over as soon as I removed the form. A more careful job the second time yielded a column of sand that I spent the next two days carving. It fell over after I sprayed the required preservative on it. There is one extant photograph of this piece.

96M-1, "Zen Sound"
World Championship at Harrison Hot Springs 1996
Photo by a friend of my sister's

That was the first multiple sculpture I ever made. The idea came from a boat ride a friend and I took back to Vancouver from the end point of the Royal Hudson train ride. It's a fjord, rockbound in curving granite. Note that I'm rather silt-colored. The shower at the end of the carving day was a real pleasure.


The other samples from British Columbia probably came from Earl, who also helped me at Harrison. It was a long time ago and I've forgotten the details.

Crescent Beach
somewhere in British Columbia
Click the image to see it larger



Tofino, northwest end of Vancouver Island
Clicking the image will bring up a larger version


Tuesday, November 7, 2017

Jewels Underfoot II: The Fingers Know

Many things happened after I took that first macrophotograph of Venice Beach coarse sand. One idea was to see if the camera could confirm what my fingers told me in the late 1980s.

My first formed sculpture in California was done on Santa Monica Beach, just north of the Pico-Kenter storm drain near lifeguard tower 18. The spot was easy to reach and had what I thought was decent sand.

As my sand perceptions became trained I started looking for sand that felt better. In 1987 I started doing sculptures in Venice because my fingers said the sand was better. There followed a hiatus for 7 years, but in 1994 I went back to Venice's Breakwater to sculpt.

Regular practice, even w hen it doesn't feel like practice, leads to learning. I noticed that the sand was different each time, which led to exploring the beach to find how the sand moved. Might there be even better sand somewhere?

I learned that, yes, there is better sand down close to the low-tide line. I could feel the fineness. Creamy, smooth, and it was also darker. It made such a difference in the sculptures that I started carrying it from the low-tide area to a spot above the coming high tide so I'd have the day to carve it.

I went on my merry way for years. I knew there were colors in the sand. It made layers in the piles I carved. The naked eye misses much detail at the scale of sand. The camera can see what I couldn't. Curiosity led me to make a series of photographs, with improved technique, of three samples of sand: Ocean Park typical mid-beach, Venice Beach high tide typical, and Venice Beach low tide.

Ocean Park mid-beach sand, collected in spring of 2017
North of Pico-Kenter storm drain, typical location used in 1984
Background grid is 1mm on center, image 15mm wide
Click on the image to see it full size



Venice Beach sand from the high tide area, collected spring 2017
Near Venice Breakwater, typical of that used in 1994 and '95
Background grid 1mm on center, image about 15mm wide
Click on the image to see it full size.



Venice Beach sand from low tide, collected in 2003, used in 03F-7
Venice Breakwater, south side
Background grid is 1mm on center, image 15mm wide
Click the image to view it full size.


You have to look closely to see the difference between the Ocean Park and Venice high-tide samples. Things to look for: greater range of sand grain sizes, and larger average. Hard to see by naked eye, but the difference is palpable when rubbed between fingers.

The fine sample is obviously different. I just missed its presence because I didn't pay much attention to the tide, starting sculptures when I could rather than when the tide was good. That changed in late 1995, and led to the 1996 Small Sculpture Revolution.

When the sand grain size is cut in half, 8 times as many of them will fit into a given volume. The aggregated grains have twice as much total surface area for water to hold onto. Small sculptures use much less and, saving energy for carving.

Not many beaches have sand so fine as that in Venice, and even there it comes and goes. A storm changes the beach. Ocean Park sand is just fine enough that it worked for my early sculptures. History in the hand, there, a fortunate alignment of interest and location.