Santa's supply chain (Part 6)

'Twas the night before Christmas and the presents were packed. Santa set off, let's hope he's not sleigh jacked.

Little old Santa has a busy night ahead of him, he needs to travel the glode before daylight to deliver gifts to all the children before they wake.

I remember my own childhood and this magical night. There was always an air of worry that Santa would not be able to find our house and fly straight by. What if he arrived and we were all still awake. We had better be on our best behaviour and get to bed as soon as we were told. My parents were masters of this theatre

Laying in bed and trying to stay awake to see the man himself meant that we were quickly asleep. It's funny that! When you want to sleep you can't and when you want to stay awake you are out like a light. listening out for any sound of sleighbells or noises on the roof. How will he come down the chimney when the fire is lighting? So many thoughts running through your little head that you exhaust yourself to sleep.

Delivery

My sixth scene for the Funtasia Christmas ice exhibition was the Night before Christmas. As a child sleeps soundly we see through the window the man himself flying through the nighttime sky.

The making of (Montage 6)

The child in bed was fun to make. Originally I was just going to make the blankets over most of the body with just have the head carved in detail above the covers. I realised that would be boring and not a very good use of ice so I figured I could carve the body in negative on the other side of the blankets. So, that is exactly what I did. This gave a nice illusion that the whole figure was there. Simple but very effective.

I then just had to make a sash window and on the back of the glass carve a negative inlay with snow showing the landscape and Santa.

It was a nice peaceful scene, as I wanted it to be.

I should really have spent more time on the head and shoulders although I think the image of a sleeping child came across okay.

The images I have are littered with the other sculptures as a background and for ice that is not good a good thing because, how should I say it? Transparency. The owners of Funtasia we asked to add Black curtains between the scenes to isolate them and make each one like its own separate world. It would also help control the lighting I had added. Alas, they went cheap and put up black plastic that looked very tacky and caused reflections that were so ugly.

40 days later

It was only when I had returned after Christmas from the other work that I discovered this. It was a big pity and something that I would have protested if I had known. I believe it made the whole exhibition look substandard. It is really details like this that I can't stand.

The sculpture still looked good. The figure in the bed had shined up nicely revealing the body underneath the blankets and the face had melted into a better form. The snow had melted away from the negative carving behind the window but the image could still be seen.

Overall I was happy with this piece.

When I started this series I said that there were 6 sculptures in all. Well, I lied! Actually, I miss counted. There were really 7 and I will be back with the last one next time.

Ps

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