Sind frei

I continued typing on Namur blue stone, just to experiment with various tools.

It's a bit too blurry for my taste, I'll try another approach but not right away.
I have to wait until the weather improves a little, temperatures and rainfall do not encourage me to work outside for now.

Blue

Sorry to have left you without news lately, I was in Belgium to give some courses, the proof in pictures :

already tired

photo bombing (no reason for only others to have fun)

And, did you know, the Namur region produces magnificent blue stones, much used in construction. My hosts (thanks again Geneviève & Eugène!) had some in their backyard that they let me bring back with me.

First engraving try, it's not that yet but it's encouraging

to be followed...

Mind moves matter (second)

I know, I already told you... but this time it really moves ;-)

Mind moves matter

It is Virgil who says it in the Aeneid and, of course, he says it in Latin: Mens agitat molem

And so, my mind, without really moving matter, transforms it.

It is a shale pebble, hand engraved with my faithful butter knife and a nail for the filigree pattern. And to give you an idea of the size, one last picture of the work when it was in progress and I was holding the pebble in my hand.

Zodiacal pebble

Inspired by this picture, I wanted to engrave a pebble with the zodiacal signs. Here is the result, not too bad for something done with an old butter knife.

And a third pic with my hand so you can guess the size of the pebble.

Making new friends

It's quite simple, you just need tools to work on stone, collect peebles and here you are ;-)

the ring

My wife lost her wedding ring. It slipped off her finger during a swam on a beach where we use to go.
The waves movements quicly make it illusive to get it back.
By way of vengeance, I picked a pebble on the beach and made her a ring out of it.
Here are the steps of the design :

The pebble (doesn't wonder what will happen to him)

The same one, sliced

To avoid to much sanding, after marking the inside diameter of the ring, more cutting

Here comes the hollowing out

The inside is sanded, time to even up the outside and to polish it all

The ring finished, all angles polished to avoid sharp edges, only the varnish to get done

And my wife's hand has a new ornament, phew, the worst has been avoided :-)

slate engraving

You know about my obsession for filigrees and my yearning for engraving, here is a little try mixing both with a pattern I invented engraved on slate with a simple nail.

The pattern is approximately 2cm large, now that I proved that it is possible, I can try more ambitious works :-)

Ein Stein ...

This post is dedicated to Iris Van de Casteele, a belgian poet who lives in Paraguay.
She honoured me by writing a poem about my works in a collection named Grains de folie, poem which my modesty forbids me to reproduce here (even if she was kindly making fun of my failures).
At the same time, she was punlishing another collection of poems, in german this time, called Reflexionen where I found the text that follows.

For those who don't speak german, this poem starts with the words : "A Stone ...". I immediately felt again in my engraving delirium and wrote/engraved the text with a gothic script on a schist pebble.

pebble

Last weekend, I went for a walk on a pebble beach not far from home where the pebbles are made of schist and not of granite as usual in the area.
I picked up some to see whether I could make something out of them.

Thus passes the glory of the world

I wrote/engraved the sentence directly, I think I will polish a bit the next one before to make sure the letters are really sharp.