Head Statue Dr. Cisneros

Plaster cast head statue
43 x 24 x 49 cm

I spend more than one hundred hours to finish its clay head statue and about twenty hours to have its plaster cast done. It's a long process and physically demanding. Usually, I can do pieces of paintings within two months but for life size head statue, there's only one. I thank my model, Dr. Cisneros for his patience to work with me everyday from Monday to Friday, four hours a day, for five weeks. I really appreciated. 

 I wash it with soap water to get rid of the orange grease, clean it and smoth the join line. 

To open up the molds.
This is the most exciting moment from the whole process. With a hammer and a rasp, i open it up carefully. My body aches and exhausted but my soul's full of joy. 

I put the two pieces of molds together and tighten them with metal wire and duck tapes. With help, I lift it up. My assistan has to shake it gently to make sure no air stay inside of plaster while I'm mixing and puring the liquid plaster in. Fill it up and let it dry for a night. 

I carefully open up the molds then I remove the clay and wash the two pieces of molds with soap water. After let it dry overnight, I apply a layer of isolat agent ( a mixture of grease and a bit of orange color oil) 

I pull out these aluminum sheets and mark the two pieces of molds before i open it up. 

I carefully splash and adding up layers of plaster on the clay statue. Once it's finished both sides, i let it dry overnight. 

Insert pieces of aluminum sheet together to form a wall to separate two pieces of plaster molds. 

Oil based clay head statue ready for the molding. 

The first session of this head statue. 

LAB4 4:6 Yaoling lee

LAB 4:6

text: Katie Numi Usher

https://youtu.be/yuQYIpzLhs4

Today Yaoling Lee brought music to the LAB. This was the first time.

Yaoling commanded the piece to start a few minutes early, she had previously made  sketches mounted on the walls. Some oils and some charcoal drawings.

"Live Painting Music & Dance" was Yaoling Lee sketching as the Pink Puma Ensemble Chelsea Thompson (viola), Joy Shi (flute), Nadiya Sedasey (violin) and Amber Shi (violin) played classical standards and a few contemporary numbers for about an hour. Later she would sketch them, quick charcoal sketches as they played solo.

For the second hour Musa Shaheed played a djembe and as he did, dancer Delbert Quilter moved. A beautiful juxtaposition of body in motion and reverb.

Each pose held by Delbert was answered by the drum's skin under Musa's palms. And all that while Yaoling sketched. Powerful!

For more on LAB4
www. imagefactorybelize. com

From left to right: me, Musa, Delbert, Amber, Chelsea and Joy. 

Photo taken by Yasser Musa

Photo taken by Yasser Musa

Photo taken by Yasser Musa

Photo taken by Yasser Musa

Photo taken by Yasser Musa

This is my dancer, Delbert. 

I did a 45 minute's oil sketch of my musicians playing various pieces of classical music. 

Photo taken by Gina Scott
Me, sketching my dancer movements 

I did a short interview with the reporter from Channel 5, a Belizean tv media at the opening of Katie's LAB4 at the gallery of Image Factory. 

The following pictures are some of the work I did for my LAB4. Charcoal on paper and oil on canvas

LAB4 "Live painting music & dance"

LAB is an experimental space inside the Image Factory's art gallery in Belize City and it's created by artist Katie Numi Usher. This is LAB's forth year and I'm ready to have my first show on this Friday. 

This is the the first rehearsal the girls and i had together at Pallotti Music School yesterday. 

Oil on canvas. 61 x 50cm
I did an one hour oil and some charcoal sketches. I was too careful. 

Oil on canvas. 61 x 50 cm
This is the second oil i did at our second practice today. The brushstrocks and colors look more confident. It's an one hour work too. 

Metal wire sculpture HUMAN 1

Metal wire sculpture
27 x 21 cm
( click the pic to get a clear image)

Have you ever felt this way?
 Floating, hanging in the middle of no where.
Yesterday, I was kind of " out of my mind", then i began to make this small sculpture. The reason why i love my work is that it gives a sense of understanding of myself. It's like therapy. Yes. It is, because "Life is art, art is life".

Head statue (Cisneros) clay finished

Oil clay head statue
43 x 47 x 27 cm

For more than one hundred hours i worked on this head statue. I could've gone further but i called it an end. It isn't finidhed. The shoulder still need adjustment. The neck isn't quite right. And i could've done a better job to bring out the essence, the mood of my model. But, it's time. Now, I should move on to have its plaster cast done soon. As for the record, this is my second head statue of this year.