Running Jack

I’m caught in some kind of vortex with numbers tumbling around me… not fast… but in slow motion… like a slow moving tornado that is sucking all the air out of every room I’m in!!

I just looked up from my computer and the latest project and glanced at the clock. Am I mistaken or was there no April this year? Funny, I would have sworn it was March. Guess I sort of missed April. Waaaaaaaa!!! Enough… it’s gone… I’ll never get it back. Onward.

Jack is growing fast, smart, funny. Standard poodles are goofs… everything is a big joke! You’re unhappy, because he just made a blizzard out of a newspaper while you were gone… and he’s lying on his back for a tummy rub. They watch and watch… study us, our movements, our routines, our voices and moods. They know us so much better than we know them… and love us without question… and teach us something every day. Jack’s lesson for today: Run around the yard more, lay in the grass, spend time watching the bees on the blueberry bushes, listen to the kids playing next door, close your eyes and listen to the wind… don’t think about anything else! Oh yeah, and share something dead that you found!

My fingers are stuck on the keys of my keyboard… I’m changing type faces and revising files… emailing and uploading digital ones and zeroes into some cloud somewhere… when I should be out looking at real clouds. I need to be exploring and sharing… like Jack. Well, not exactly like Jack… nobody wants to see what Jack shares.

So… here’s my ‘sharing’ part. I’ve been wanting to work with some dark red sculptors wax that I got from a foundry in Boston during a visit about 4 years ago. The foundry pours metal into molds made from the wax figures that artist’s make. The artists use clay and other materials to make sculptures which then are used to make molds. Wax is poured into the mold… then that is used to make a mold that the molten metal will fill. Or… the artist can work directly with the wax to make the figure… and cut out a couple of steps. Great for small pieces. OK, what’s the downside? The dark colored wax is more like a stone to work with!! It’s so hard you can sand it! So, you have to melt it to get it so you can work with it… but not so hot it burns you. I have it melting in a cheap covered saucepan on a buffet hot plate in the studio… and scoop out a little at a time to push and scrape with some makeshift tools I’ve scavenged from around the house. My on-line research has me looking for alcohol torches, lighter fluid and dental tools. More about that later as I learn to make the little rough sketches in wax more refined. The little dogs are about 2.5 inches on the long dimension.

Jack, thanks for the lesson and the inspiration! Now it’s time to go lay in the grass.

my bed

sit

poodles

© Susana Weber and Tattoo Communications, 2012. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Susana Weber and with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.