My Sculpture Weblog: Sculptural Knife Vase

The Sculptural Knife Vase

I’ve been teasing for a lot of months that I’ve been working
on a knife mission…. What sort of knife mission?… Why, a flower vase after all! A
machined metallic flower vase with fifteen razor-sharp hardened metal blades that
encircle its valuable blooming cargo.

(Really dried flowers on this case, it’s winter in any case)

This will look like an odd mixture, perhaps even a tad tongue in cheek, nevertheless this piece
has been in growth for a number of years and embodies lots of the themes I
have been laying out over the previous few tasks. It connects quite a few
conceptual threads in my work, and does so in ways in which have been surprising even to me.

So please tuck in for an extended learn (in case you are inclined) and
I’ll do my finest to clarify.

Preface

I’ve spent a whole lot of time desirous about conventional craft-forms
inside varied studio artwork actions. Practices equivalent to glasswork, woodturning,
and ceramics are all crafts that received their begin on a manufacturing facility ground lots like
machine-work. Nevertheless these crafts differ from machining in a number of essential
methods.

Not like machining, every of the above craft actions
represents a course of that has largely fallen out of commercial use. They’ve since
been picked up by artisans and have been turned in the direction of extra inventive ends. Likewise, these
crafts have signature shapes and varieties which can be widespread inside their commerce
(Vases, bowls, urns and so on). They’re shapes that inform that crafts explicit historical past.
Most of those varieties are used to study their respective practices and have
turn into inseparable from that crafts visible language.

These craft-forms are of curiosity to me as a result of whereas
machining is a craft that shares an analogous industrial previous, there are few signature varieties one can level to that uniquely consultant it as a medium. The machinist panorama appears to lack ubiquitous varieties that fall
neatly into the identical paradigm of craft and craft-form. One possible motive is that machine-work is a sprawling self-discipline full of specialised abilities. The vary of instruments
and processes at play are so diverse it’s almost unattainable to search out tasks
which can be analogous to what one finds in a woodturning class or glass blowing
studio.

Due to this absence of distinctive craft-forms inside the world
of machined metallic, I’ve spent appreciable time exploring what a “machined craft-form” could be. Ought to machining ultimately
discover higher standing as a sculptural medium, what varieties may come to outline it?

I undertook all kinds of tasks to discover this, together with
hand-held kinetic artwork tasks, a machined vessel sequence, and even a number of collaborations
with different makers and machinists. These tasks drew inspiration from lots of
the economic crafts listed above, in addition to developments inside the modern
machinist neighborhood, and even historic craft-forms equivalent to Japanese Netsuke and
Chinese language snuff bottles.

The Sharp Arts

The historical past of the knife is the historical past of mans materials
progress. Like machine-work, it embodies a large spectrum of metalworking
processes. One can discover numerous practitioners nonetheless placing hammer to anvil
in a approach that’s 1000’s of years previous. And whereas its historic traditions
are alive and nicely, the world of knife making has additionally been utterly
remodeled by the adoption of contemporary machine instruments and new know-how.

The Sculpture Connection

Whereas varied knife makers have impressed my work, I discovered it
tough to method the craft immediately via my work. My course of usually
entails stripping away the utility from varied design or craft ideas to higher reveal what’s aesthetically attention-grabbing about them. I felt that it
could be unattainable to strip the utility from a knife and nonetheless have an
object that’s each attention-grabbing and spoke meaningfully to the craft.


It lastly occurred to me that it isn’t mandatory to totally strip
the utility from a knife to understand its inherent aesthetic qualities; one
can merely put these qualities into a singular context. My earlier tasks
involving historic craft-forms have (oddly sufficient) supplied me a conceptual
bridge of types. They’ve provided me with the mandatory framework inform a narrative about
materials progress and blade making on the identical time.

The mission

Now there could also be a few of you on the market who’re delay by the
thought of exploring weapons of any variety as artwork, however I feel this piece simply
demonstrates that knives could be many issues apart from that. I actually am not
solely certain what all of the implications of utilizing blades as sculptural components
could be. However to those that could be crucial, I ask that you just preserve an open thoughts, and acknowledge that most of the time, knives are instruments like every other.

There may be magnificence (and humor) to be present in even probably the most tactical aesthetics inside
the inventive industrial arts, so whereas it’s simple to guage, it’s way more
attention-grabbing to discover, and it’s my intention to do the latter.

Technical Notes:

Since I used to be retaining this work type of a secret, I used to be not
capable of share course of photographs in actual time like I’ve turn into accustom, so under
is breakdown of a few of the challenges I confronted in addition to a few of the
documentation I made alongside the best way. 
Once more, a little bit of a learn, however for these within the nuts and bolts
of the mission, it ought to be attention-grabbing.

Whereas my desire is to introduce new strategies one at a
time, tackling knife making made that method fairly unattainable. I used to be in over
my head in too some ways to depend, which was refreshing and disorienting on the identical time. I had
by no means made a knife blade earlier than (not on goal anyway), so there may be quite a
lot to the touch on right here.

Machining the blades:

There are a number of widespread methods to make knife blades, some are
solid (assume hammer and anvil), some begin with pre-made bar inventory and go straight
to the grinder to create the form, and nonetheless others machine the vast majority of
the geometry after which go to ending operations. In my case, I clearly needed
to machine the blades, however this isn’t as simple because it first appears.

For starters, I had by no means machined excessive efficiency knife
steels earlier than. Knife steels are a lot more durable than the alloys I usually choose.
They’re unforgiving to machine, so set-ups and machining parameters have to be
rather more fastidiously utilized. Selecting an acceptable alloy was daunting, however after
a whole lot of analysis, I settled on a metal referred to as AEBL. Like all knife steels, it
has execs and cons to be used as knife metal.

The professional: AEBL is utilized in a whole lot of kitchen cutlery, so it’s
fairly widespread and simple to supply. It has nice corrosion resistance and is understood
to be comparatively simple to harden and sharpen. It’s also fairly cheap,
which is essential for an experiment with so many blades in it. Unique knife
steels can get extraordinarily pricy, and there was no have to be unnecessarily spendy
when good choices abound.

The con: Surprisingly, there was not a whole lot of data on
machining AEBL. I had a tough time getting suggestions on chopping parameters.
I got here to study it’s because AEBL is primarily utilized in making giant amount
business blades. It’s extra generally reduce with abrasives processes like water
jet cutters or lasers, after which floor to last form. That didn’t imply it was
un-machine-able, it simply meant that that it wasn’t widespread, so data was
scarce. I did ultimately get some helpful steering from a fellow knife maker to
use as a place to begin.

General: As soon as work received underway, I discovered that AEBL wasn’t
horrible to machine, even on the modest instruments that I’ve, the end was
truly fairly good. However, whereas the machines dealt with it nicely sufficient, I needed to
take my time and never push issues. I discovered that AEBL has some abrasive
properties to it that wore the top mills quicker than anticipated.

Since I needed to make 15 blades (plus some spares) for the
mission, I burned via extra $25 cutters than I care to confess. A few of this
untimely put on may have been mitigated with a extra inflexible and balanced tooling
arrange, however I soldiered via, took my time, and ended up with fairly nice
outcomes.

Beneath can be a video displaying a few of the fixture-ing and the
warping points I additionally encountered.

Warmth-treating and Hardening metal:

One other course of I had little expertise with was
heat-treating and hardening metal. Whereas that is one thing that toolmakers and
machine designers are fairly acquainted, as a sculptor, it simply isn’t one thing I had
a lot of a necessity for, till now.

Warmth-treating is fascinating for a lot of causes; chief amongst
them is that it makes a lot of the metallic work I do potential. At its easiest,
machining is just utilizing a more durable materials, to chop a barely softer one. When
milling brass with metal, this will appear a easy mater of fabric choice.
However when chopping one type of metal, with an analogous type of metal, issues begin
to get technically attention-grabbing and down proper philosophical.

That is grossly oversimplified, however consider it this fashion,
the primary consider figuring out metal’s hardness is its carbon content material, and the way
these carbon atoms are organized inside the metallic. Warmth-treating is how one
arranges the atoms to create the hardness one wishes. Cutters and blades solely
have to be barely more durable than the fabric they intend to chop. So it’s
solely potential to take two items of the identical alloy, heat-treat one to make
it onerous, after which deal with the opposite in order that it’s smooth. From there you may simply
form and reduce one with the opposite, kind of like chopping heat softened butter
with a more durable piece of frozen butter. That’s fascinating stuff.

Sharpening metal:

Whereas I’ve been shaping metallic for many years, I had by no means
deliberately drawn a razor sharp edge onto a chunk of metallic for the needs
of constructing artwork. I’ve sharpened cutlery in a utilitarian context, however by no means in
a approach that was cautious of the geometry and polish of the metal. Sharpening
blades with precision was one other ability I must hone (get it).

There are seasoned knife makers who’ve perfected their sharpening method
over a few years, and over 1000’s of knives. Some can draw an edge onto a
blade standing at a guide grinder in just some minutes utilizing some hard-earned
muscle reminiscence. I nevertheless, would not have this ability (but!) so regardless of my lengthy
profession in metalworking; I needed to compensate for inexperience with the usage of a
sharpening fixture.

All of my sculptures are constructed round some novel meeting technique or engineering idea that I can categorical in a visually attention-grabbing approach, and this work is not any exception.

Every blade has a T formed backbone that engages with a comparable slot alongside the size of the vessel physique. The blades are secured by a few tiny setscrews that have interaction the backbone and supply a clamping pressure for the blades in every slot.

The screws are accessed from the other aspect of the
vessel, by reaching via the work from the ornamental pin holes precisely
reverse the lock screw. From there, the remainder of the meeting was fairly straight ahead, I used the ornamental pin holes as further locking set screws for the chrome steel liner of the vase.

I made a brief video to display the idea.  (under)

As you may see within the video, I additionally made some enjoyable
gadgets for shifting the work with out having to the touch the blades, one thing that
wanted fairly a bit of additional consideration. Getting this factor into place with out hurting your self or others is definitely fairly difficult. 

Anyhow, thanks for studying. 

As at all times, questions and feedback are fairly welcome.