“Transcendence” A visit to the Voigt Ranch
It had been 12 years since I last saw this sculpture of mine. I offered to the Voigt Family that I take a look at it and possibly clean it up and seal the concrete surface again. But after seeing it, it was clear that it had aged appropriately and had become part of the landscape and any alteration of it would be a disservice to it’s nature. I was pleased in fact to see how it had decayed and how the moss had enveloped it.
Back in 2012 the piece had been slated for “Spirit of the Man”, a Voigt Family Sculpture Foundation exhibit in memory of Al Voigt and his service to the Sonoma County public art community. Judy, his wife purchased the art work after the exhibit ended and it went to their ranch. Their son, Che was the model for the life cast. Most of the sculptors in the exhibit knew Al but I had not ever met him so I felt that an obvious bridge to an understanding of him would be to invite his son, Che to model for the life cast. He agreed, although I don’t think he really knew what he was in for. At the time I was between studios so the small dining area in my one bedroom apartment became the studio for the body cast. Che and his wife, Cairen arrived with a bottle of wine and we got to work. The cast was done with plaster while the other areas of the cast comprised of industrial parts like gears and tires were cast with a flexible rubber mold. In the end it was the most complex form I had ever built and in the process it was a source of anxiety and stress. Since it was a one time mold it meant that if the cast failed I would have lost all the work I had done and I would have had to start over. The notion of the potential disaster kept me up at night. But finally, the day came to pour the concrete. In one single pour the piece was cast weighing in at 1500 pounds. After a couple days I removed the mold to reveal a perfect cast. I then cleaned it up and applied an acid color stain to give it an aged effect.
