THIS
STORY LAST UPDATED:
15 July 2003 1525 BST
The
Art Ache |
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| The
triptych sculpture on Saga House, Victoria, London |
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On
some of the most prestigious buildings in Hamburg, London and Bath
are the wild and monumental sculptures of local artist Barry Baldwin.
We caught up with Barry for a tour of his amazing house and for an
insight into his sculptural work... |
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Charging out, over a metre, over a street in London and weighing more
than 12 tonnes explodes a trio of roaring stone animals.
The triptych, dominated by the head of a bellowing bull elephant and
flanked by an enormous tiger and an orang-utan, is life-size, life-like
and powerful.
In
Hamburg in one of the city's busiest centres, suspended over the main
entrance, hangs a giant bronze centaur in mid-flight.
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| Bronze
sculpture of a Centaur that hangs at the entrance of The Levantehaus
in Hamburg |
Whilst
in the centre itself a magnificent rotunda is adorned with a swirling
mass of creatures. The full size head of a white rhino battles for
position with a snarling lion and the flailing tentacles of a giant
squid.
Wild and powerful these monumental sculptures are the work of local
artist, Barry Baldwin, whose dramatic pieces have become an integral
part of buildings throughout Europe.
Created on a massive scale Baldwin's sculptures are on continual public
display and designed to exist long after the creator has gone:
"My job is to make something that is permanent that will fit into
a scenario.
"My work is on the street and that's like the gallery of the world.
It's the world's biggest gallery."
With
a long apprenticeship in a Dorset quarry and stints in a local foundry
and at art school Baldwin's work returns again and again to the theme
of endangered animals.
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| Barry
Baldwin at work |
Studying
videos and photographs and watching the animals in zoos Baldwin works
to capture the sense and movement of his subjects.
But faced with a rough block of marble to carve is it as Michelangelo
quoted: 'I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him
free.'
"If you've been trained as a carver from day one you've always been
used to that terrific problem of finding it in the stone.
"I can't draw actually. It's a three dimensional problem. It's more
sophisticated than drawing in my opinion."
But, according to Barry, the classic Hamlet cigar ad with the sculptor
tapping the finishing touches to his masterpiece just as an arm falls
off is a complete myth:
"All material has flaws, there just isn't such a thing as a perfect
piece of stone or marble it just doesn't exist.
"So
you've got to work around that - it's just a matter of where the flaws
are. You have an idea because you can ring or tap the stone and can
hear a defect in it. If it's badly vented you disregard it."
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| An
orang-utan - part of the Central Rotunda in the Levantehaus |
But carving
can be slow, heavy and physically demanding.
And in an age when fast build projects are the norm Baldwin has turned
to modelling to keep pace:
"If you're a modeller you can do both you can build it up and take
it away so you've got the best of both worlds."
Using a blow torch and a welding kit his structures start life as
an armature with pipes and wires making up the basic bone structure.
From this Baldwin builds up a clay model.
"The most exciting part is after two hours of intense modelling is
to see it there from nothing."
Using the 5,000-year-old lost wax process a mould is made of the original
clay model. The mould is filled with liquid wax and the resulting
wax cast covered in plaster. The wax is then melted away or lost to
leave an empty cavity into which the bronze is poured.
With modelling Baldwin can work very quickly:
"I modelled the cheetah in just two hours. I thought to do it
very quickly would seem appropriate because they're the fastest creature
on earth."
The result is a blur a cheetah caught mid-sprint almost out of focus:
"When you see something running you never actually see it. You
do see a blur, it's a blur."
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| The
carved doorway of the Grand Buildings on Trafalgar Square in
London |
But it's
not just endangered species that become memorialised by Baldwin. The
architect for the Levantehaus in Hamburg, for instance, is the face
of the giant bronze centaur.
And the 30 odd portraits adorning the same building are the faces
of the clients, architects, engineers and administrators involved
in the project:
"It's important to get a likeness but some people are easier to do
than others. One of the architects I worked on, I worked on him for
ages, but I couldn't stop him looking 20 years older than he was."
When the architect's wife complained Baldwin pointed out that in 20
years he'd look young.
But with the egos of those selected on the line isn't there a temptation
to flatter the subject?
"I always flatter the women. I elongate their necks and turn their
head so that they look like they're in a Vogue magazine."
But it's not just the faces of the architects that turn up in Baldwin's
work. On the Grand Buildings in Trafalgar Square the 27 made-up portrait
heads have, as Baldwin points out, more than a passing resemblance
to his family and friends.
Letting go of his work, however, is hard. Baldwin's house, designed
and built by him over 15 years, is filled with the casts of his work:
"I make the actual thing and then before it goes I take a mould.
Everything you see is on a building somewhere.
"But it's heart wrenching to let anything go because they're all mine
even when they're in the street they're mine too.
"It's a heartache, no it's an artache." |
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Barry Baldwin was born is Staffordshire and attended Stafford
College of Art and Design and Bath Academy.
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