NYC inspired sculptures

In the summer of 2002 my family and I visited New York City.  As one does, I did a lot of walking in the city.  There are a lot of road construction sites in that city. Construction crews were using large timbers, painted white with red strips, as barriers and traffic control.  This has stuck with me, and once back in my studio, I started creating sculptures that were inspired by what I had seen in NYC.

'Sweden vs. NYC'-2013

'Turn Here or There'-2013

The sculptures are made from re-claimed construction timbers that have been joined together with chisel and mallet joint work.  They are painted in high gloss exterior acrylic paint.  As it turns out, 'Turn Here or There' makes for a pretty great outdoor love seat.  The sculptures are attached to steel plates that can be bolted to a concrete footing or pad.

After completion of these two pieces, I had a lot of cut-off sections of construction timber.  I have used all of the scrap pieces to make a bunch of wonderful small sculptures.  These woodblock sculptures were made with a japanese pull saw, chisels, a file, and an old Rockwell band saw.  They have all been sanded and protected with two coats of varnish. You can see the rest of the wood block series at my website on the 'available work' page(link below):

AVAILABLE ART WORK

Woodblock series #12130

"Log Through Cement" 2001

"Log Through Cement"

Artist:  Christopher Casanova

Paris, France 2001

Dimensions:  Concrete slab is 4' x 6'

Materials:  Fallen tree, concrete, and steel.

It is a little funny how much a 4' x 6' slab of concrete weighs.  This sculpture was made for an exposition at a cultural space outside of Paris.  I poured the slab on site, and I had a really challenging time getting the mass of concrete from horizontal to vertical.  As often times is the case, I was working alone, with pry bars, timbers, and a chain attached to a car.  "Log Through Cement"  was transported and set up three times before  it took permanent residence in the front yard of a client's home in Rueil-Malmaison, France.

"Hollow Wood Cube" 2009

"Hollow Wood Cube" 

Artist:  Christopher Casanova

Santa Monica,  2009

Dimensions: 18" x 18" x 18"

Materials:  Found timbers and blocks of wood

My studio is located in a hanger at the Santa Monica Airport in Santa Monica, California.  I have a rather small interior work space, basically two single car garages length wise, which I use for painting and planning. There is also a covered outside workshop which is where I make smaller sculptures. "Hollow Wood Cube"  comes from this covered workshop.  

The piece, as its name implies, is hollow and is made from re-sized found timbers and blocks. I made it hollow so that it would be relatively light. There are so many facets and details to see that I wanted the sculpture to be  easy to move.  Turns out, it is rather heavy, but one can still flip and turn the cube. The sculpture was built from the inside out and there is no evidence of attachment (i.e. screw heads or nails.)

'Big Wheel' Paris, France 2002/2004

'Big Wheel' Installation View

Artist: Christopher Casanova

Place des Invalides, Paris, France 2004

In 1999 a wind storm named Lothar swept through France, knocking down tens of thousands of trees in forests surrounding Paris. That winter, following the storm, I began to work with fallen trees in the forests north of Paris. The tree trunks that I used for 'Big Wheel' where from the Forest of Fontainebleau. Each of the thirteen pieces were spliced together with a blind square stub tenon to form the ring measuring over three meters in diameter.

'Big Wheel' Installation View

Artist: Christopher Casanova

Place des Invalides, Paris, France 2004

The majority of the wood work was done in the forest with hand tools and the final fitting done in my atelier in the 5th. The wheel fit together and came apart with relative ease and was first assembled as part of an solo exhibition at the Galerie Ortille Fourcat in the 4th arrondisment. Two years later it was reassembled in the gardens of the Place des Invalides, where it remained as a semi-permanent guerilla installation.

'Big Wheel' Installation View

Artist: Christopher Casanova

Galerie Ortille-Fourcat, Paris, France 2002