Graeme Mitcheson – Stone Sculptor, ARBS

Tom scales the climbing boulder in his socks !

This is a picture of “Tom” trying out the climbing boulder in Handsworth Community Park near Sheffield. I spent a few hours there last week carving some hand and foot holes into the boulders so that they provide a challenging climbing rock for the kids. Guided by Tom, a climbing expert, I carved holes and handles so that there were opportunities for climbers of all abilities to manoeuvre around the rock. Although I still have a few more bits to carve on it, Tom managed to climb all the way around the stone which I have to say was very impressive.

This week I am based in Rawlins Community College in Quorn, Leicestershire where I will be helping the kids to make 3 sculptural seats. I popped along last week to help them to generate some ideas for the sculptures. There were some exciting designs and I have the selected the 3 to be carved this week. I will post some images here during the course of the week to show how they are getting on.

The stone carving courses that I am running in April and May are now fully booked. I will sort out another couple of dates for later in the year and post them on here. I still run individual tuition during the week though if you are keen to come and learn in the meantime.

Someone took this picture of the fork lift driver and me sharing an intimate moment last week installing the Market Warsop sculpture. I must admit, I dread installing the big sculptures. I will usually have spent several weeks or months intricately carving a stone and then I put my faith in someone else and a machine to finish the job, all very stressful. Added to which, when I have carved the piece in the workshop it is to all intents and purposes complete, if any more stone is knocked off it after that – it was not meant to be! Anyway, this install went as well as any and it is always a great relief when it is done.

I installed this sculpture in Market Warsop, Nottinghamshire today. It was a tricky operation as the site was by the stream in a particularly boggy part of the Carrs (a kind of park come nature trail). Usually, I can just turn up with a hi-ab lorry and drop it in place. Today, I hired a hi-ab to take it from the workshop to the car park for the site, craned it off onto my own pick up, drove it across the field (3 times) and assembled it using the fork lift you can see in the picture. This is always more risky as the fork lift does not have the manoeuvrability or the accuracy of a crane lift. Luckily the driver today was excellent and very patient which always helps.  The sculpture looks great on this site and it was much appreciated by the passers by that I spoke to today. So ends one of the longest running public art projects that I am ever likely to be involved in, I was first asked to make the piece in the autumn of 2008. So, 3 arts officers, a number of different sites and a few grumpy water voles later …..

Lowering the sculpture

All done, the Kilkenny Limestone sculpture in Market Warsop, Notts.

and finally there is a happy ending.

Untitled but I am working on it.....

Early last month I installed this twisting sculpture in Nether Whitacre, North Warwickshire. I spent some time talking through ideas and themes for the work with residents of the village. I decided that there were 4 themes coming through that needed incorporating into the artwork in some way. They were all things that they felt were important in the development of the village over the years. Thus the 4 sided sculpture with the themes gradually twisting together. The 4 themes were the railway, agriculture, the rivers and the flora and fauna of the village. The stone is Woodkirk Sandstone from a quarry near Leeds. This is probably the best sandstone that I have carved, tight grained and good colour.  Unfortunately the service at the quarry can be rather unpredictable in my experience.  This sculpture is 1 of 3 that I created for the North Arden Heritage Trail during 2009. The others were in Fillongley and Ansley. You will find pictures of these on my website at www.chisel-it.co.uk

As you can see, I have moved the top half of the Kilkenny Limestone sculpture so that I can work at a comfortable height on the bottom piece. Carving work is almost done which just leaves the polishing which is probably one of the most boring jobs on earth.

Moving the sculpture

I move the sculpture using the gantry for slow and careful lifting and also a device called a split pin lewis. This means you can move it safely without risk of damaging edges by using slings etc.

Welcome to my 1st ever blog post. Hopefully you will have visited www.chisel-it.co.uk where you will have seen images of my sculptures and the sort of stuff that I get up to including courses and work in schools etc. I hope that this blog site will allow me to post up to date pics of my work and sculptures evolving from rough blocks through to the finished pieces. I will also post dates of courses and any events that I will be attending.

Right now in the workshop I am coming towards the end of a sculpture due to be sited in Market Warsop in Notts. It is a Kilkenny Limestone piece about 2m tall. As you can see, parts of the stone are polished and I have worked back into these to create texture and the finished surface.  Kilkenny limestone is a beast of a stone, not great for carving but it does take a good polish and picks up the textures that I wanted. It is extremely hard for a limestone and therefore great for a public sculpture. I have used it before on a number pieces, the mussel sculpture on Conwy Quay being my favourite to date. This piece even made it onto the Antiques Road Show when Fiona Bruce talked about the mussel fishing industry while more recently made it into the Britannica Book of Molluscs (or something similar) You can see this on the opening page of www.chisel-it.co.uk The 1st time I used Kilkenny was for the seats in Museum Square in Leicester in 2003. The polish on these has faded but it has kept a good shine where people have been touching and climbing on them which is great.

I will continue to post pics about the sculpture as it comes closer to completion.