the rum soaked fist: internal martial arts forum

I also don't know what it is. But I do really like it.

Winter, Beijing.....
Practice place, mind sweeper

beautiful

everything wrote:I also don't know what it is. But I do really like it.

It has no purpose, function or meaning.

The whole meditative foray into 'negative space' was really trippy and I guess one would have to go there to find that out for themselves - although I wouldn't recommend it to any one who doesn't live the Neutrality Principle. True void where the Creative is silent and conspicuously absent.

As for the renderings themselves, they're just pieces of wood I used to capture negative space and don't really represent the subject matter of the work. Although I really have a blast shaping, carving and fitting everything together, they're nothing more than Meditative Space-Craft.

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HELP!...I'm trapped in a roundabout of artsy pretentiousness and the only exit is satiated self-indulgence!

See, Wayne, ^ that's how to use metaphor

hmm really interesting, appreciate the descriptions!

There are some incredible green intuition concepts encompassing Meditative Movement (see Larkey et al) where some countries in Asia,and in some parts of UK are actually constructing what may be called a version of "Meditative Space" where the external environment is architecturally transformed and unites with the intrinsic self personal state of being to magnify this intersection of internal/external, both altering and feeding off each other not unilke the yin-yang symbol.

The Forest Walking concept/tradition (japan) where being in nature, the exhange of CO2/oxygen, the fresh air breeze against your skin, the natural internal/exchange and symbiotic euphoria in and out within the cosmos,

Thought this mnight be apropos to the concept of external space serving as a conduit for, and of intrinsic self health managenment.
The influence of green space in physical activity.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6693084/

Health, Identification and Pleasure: An Ethnographic Study on the Self-Management and Construction of Taijiquan Park Culture Space
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8394485/

Getting kinda tired of chasing something that isn't there...until it is

The time spent in the meditative phase, and then the interpretive process of defining the experience hasn't all been wasted. But the only solid take-away I have from the last six months of exploring negative space in mind and medium is that more is less and less is more. All the rest of what is written about and 'explained' by the educated experts really is just artsy fartsy bullshit.

The idea goes way back in time to prehistoric hand prints that are preserved in caves in different parts of the world. Whatever the meanning is/was to the people that made them, they elicit the same curiosity and searching eyes that modern renderings of negative space are intended to inspire.

Those conclusions (my own) have pointed to the exit off the roundabout of artsy pretentiousness, and to resuming the journey of "meditative space craft". So this is one for the road:









I had a couple of the previous pieces in an art exhibition and auction. This one was commssioned by a guy who wanted something "...really unique and different". I told him; "in that case, I'll make one out of scraps and short chunks I have laying around." He was hesitant to agree - probably thinking I was offended or whatever by the request - but laid his money down anyway.

The horns are purpleheart laminated in two layers with american walnut tips and brow. The mount is arctic birch suspended between laminates of black walnut, red cedar, and hickory outer layers.

Finished this slim Bowie the night before Festivus. Haven't decided on a sheath yet.


Blade - 8 1/4" D2 with a brushed finish HRC 56-58

O/A - 13 1/8"

Guard and pommel - brushed 316 stainless

The handle is pattern-stacked black walnut. It's shaped and contoured to match a section of well-worn handle on one of my estwing framing hammers:

People don't stop wantin' these

A lady wanted one for her husband's rec room but the room doesn't have the wall space to accommodate the 38'' span of a normal piece, so these horns only span 26". The proportionality really works well - better than expected.

The horns are laminated in 3 layers consisting of Cherry outer layer, red cedar middle layer and hickory inner layer with walnut tips and brow.

The struts for the frame are laminated in five layers with a walnut middle layer sandwiched between layers of angelum pedra, and hickory outer layers. The mount and snout are spruce:









Decided to play with the proportionality a bit, and made this one for next month's local art exhibition.

The struts for the horns are canary wood laminated in 2 layers with purpleheart tips and red oak brow. The span is 30" and it works nicely with the 14 1/2" height/length of the frame.

The struts for the frame are laminated in 4 layers with purpleheart sandwiched between layers of canary with an inside layer of ash. The mount and snout are black walnut:

Someone wanted one for a friend's housewarming gift

The struts for the (longbows) horns are hickory laminated in 2 layers with padauk floating tips and red oak brow piece

The struts for the frame have a padauk core between layers of angelim pedra, with cherry wood outers. The crown and snout are cherry wood:

You Sir are an artist

wayne hansen wrote:You Sir are an artist

My personal dogma on 'artistry' leaves that hanging as either a compliment or a gut-shot

That dogma states that 'an artist's only true skill is their ability to hide their mistakes', and, that one must give pause to the cliched query of every thing they create; "...but is it art?"

Being an artist is easy. Heck, look at all the 'internal martial artists' (as an example) in the world. How many of them are creative enough to actually own the material they practice without deference to the doctrine of their 'teacher(s)' or their 'style'? How many are creative enough to develop their own, original training methods and material that imparts repeatable skill in others while remaining true to the principles and methods, free of those doctrines? It's tricky.

Being original (in art) ain't so easy because it comes from a positivity and/or stoicism that disregards doctrine, and the pursuit of duplication.

Duplication of a teacher's personal skill is one-in-a-thousand when it comes to IMA and is pretty much relegated to the law of averages...and maybe relies to a certain extent on similar or identical talent(s) and life-path as the teacher - a rare thing.

Sorry for the barnyard sermon, but your comment brought those thoughts to mind when I read it.

As for the pieces themselves, the first tenet of my personal dogma doesn't really apply because of the degree of difficulty in their construction and assembly - that there is very little margin for error, and hiding mistakes is almost impossible without losing symmetry. I'm satisfied with a non-answer to the second tenet as you've shown your discerning eye for 'art' with the question you posted earlier in this thread

I'd have to blame their execution on craftsmanship, and fairly attribute the originality of the concept to Neutrality Principle