Public Art Project/Bridge Pier

Aside from being in Germany, I can't imagine a better way to spend my summer. We began on June 4th and we have exactly 8 weeks to finish an artwork installation on a bridge pier at Wrightstown and Tanque Verde. The following are two images of the design concept. The lizards are blue for placement purposes and will not be that flagrant.



The design motif in the background is borrowed from a pottery pattern on a Hohokam pot. The ancient Hohokam had many settlements in the Tanque Verde Basin. Although the design appears to be simple, it is really quite complex.










The background pattern will be constructed from 8"x8" relief tiles using a terracotta clay. The lizards will be created in high sculptural relief using a B-mix clay with grog. The wall is almost 12 by 15 feet, so that means a lot of work and a lot of clay!



I am fortunate to have six wonderful young art apprentices to help. Rebecca is my artist assistant and I don't think I could do the project without her. BTW, Rebecca finally has her website up: Rebecca Macaulay

A big thank you goes to principal Hans Raymond at Tucson Accelerated High School for allowing us to use their art classroom.

I am amazed how quickly the girls are learning to use the clay. We began with learning how to cut clay, then to make relief, and now they are doing small sculptural lizards to prepare them for working on the real ones, which will be six feet in length.


Rikki




















Trenna


















Rebecca's experiment with a small lizard.
















Rebecca at the slab roller.



Caitlin


















Emily


















Ali


















Brittany