Hans Christian Andersen - sand sculpture

For many carvers working on the demo sculpture in the Danish projects it is like being sent to purgatory, as to try and turn it into something that reads as one piece can be difficult. You were usually working with carvers of all levels of competence and Ego which don't always see eye to eye.. Some carvers had never touched sand before and some had very strong opinions and just want to do their own thing with no thought to what was going on around them.. For me I don't mind and this challenge spurs me on to try and make it a success. Maybe that's just my ego talking or maybe it is my other love of film directing that makes me want to try and pull everything together and keep an eye on the bigger picture. Do what I can to bring out the best in the cast and crew and help make something that everyone can be proud of.

The fact that you have such a massive canvas to play with gives so many possibilities. Unfortunately, it usually ends up like the last one I showed Here as a montage of stuff with no overall flow or composition but for this one I am happy with how it worked out.

For this one in Copenhagen, Denmark @stijgerart and I were the two, what we would call professional sand sculptors and we had a team of around 12 other sculptors to work with us. It wasn't like we were the bosses or anything it was more that were the two not scared to just get started. When you are looking at a block for sand nearly 14 meter tall you need to just get stuck in and trust that you can pull it together.

The theme of the project was Hans Christian Andersen and was to celebrate the hundredth year of his birth. His wonderful fairy tales were already the theme of a competition running at the same time. Our Demo sculpture was supposed to be about the man himself. A big bust portrait seemed like a good starting point so we climbed to the top and started. Having everyone up top carving wouldn't be a good idea we would all be in each others way and trying to make a portrait with 14 people wouldn't work. How would you divide it up, each person makes an eye, ear, mouth, nose, cheek? It would end up like a Picasso cubist painting.

While Wilfred and I made the top we formed an idea of what would come next. Hans Christian Andersen, as well as being known for his writing was also a big fan of paper- cutting. That is, making designs from paper, he used them to illustrate his stories as he told them to children. It was another extension of his artform. As a team we thought that this was a nice element to include in the sculpture. The other carvers could spend the time, until we were ready for them on top to make designs and templates.
As more space opened up for carving we would able to have other people start to resolve the rest of the sculpture.
Then we hit on an idea.

The tower of babel

If we created a spiral walkway around the sand all the way down all parts of the sculpture could be accessible to all carvers and everyone could get to work quicker. We took off all the wooden forms and dug a ledge as we went. Now every one could get to work and add their designs. This would also mean we could stand back on top for a nice photo.

After the carving of the bust up top we made lots of dripping liquidy stuff under it with cut-throughs to make the top seem lighter and a separation for what was to come. Letting light come through really worked although, we had to be careful not to weaken the structure too much.

Can you dig it?

For the rest of the project my only tool was a shovel as I prepared the rest of the sculpture for the others to have a place to carve. In some ways it felt like I was not carving at all but for me trying to make all the sculpture work was my mission and one I gladly took on.
I really noticed when I got back to Ireland that my chest and shoulder muscles had expanded like I was some sort of bodybuilder. My moobies (Man breasts) were as hard as a rock. To be honest I really enjoy the physicality of sand sculpture and working on a piece this big.

It was a great team to work with, and even though there was some hard work to pull it off I think we were all quite proud of the piece. In many ways I think it was one of the more impressive demos I have seen. Very rarely do they look like anything more than a montage. Being able to climb to the top after it was finished was a big bonus even though it made me quite dizzy to make the journey.

Down the bottom, someone made a scissors at the end of the spiral (It may have been me). I think it was a fitting end to the composition.

Ps

Thanks for reading. I use Steem to document my work as an ephemeral Sculptor of sand, snow and ice, among other things. This will hopefully give it a new life on the Steem blockchain. Below you will find some of my recent posts.