Perpetual Evolution - ice sculpture

Evolution seems to be something that is relegated to a historical idea. It is easy to think that all the bugs have been worked out and that we are now living in a time of perfection. but of course that is not the case. Maybe for us humans we have been able to slow down the process as we have in many ways created our own environment to contend with but I am sure as time goes on we will notice changes in our biological makeup as we breed out all the uncool kids that are just not with it.

And so was the inspiration behind this piece. That we are at a snapshot in time and not at the end as we can be forgiven for thinking. We of course are the things questioning the thing, if you catch my drift. Anyway i don't have any predictions on what we will become (I am only a sculptor after all) but I am sure that starting to augment ourselves both biologically and electronically is on the cards and how that will transform what it is to be human is anybodies guess.

Stuck in the middle with you

With this sculpture I wanted to explore this idea that we are in the middle and not the end of this survival of the fittest relay race. It was made in a little park in the center of Tallinn, Estonia for some sort of ice sculpture trail around the city. I was given a 2 meter by 1 meter by 50 cm block of ice to play with and off I went. Being the depths of winter and -22c I didn't have much audience. People rushed by as they hurried from one warm place to another, for me I was 8 hrs a day working on my sculpture during the 4 days. When it is this this cold frostbite is a worry and the ice takes on a much more tensile quality, much harder but very fragile so lots of care has to be taken.

Divide and conquer

I started by cutting up the block using some sort of sudo Fibonacci mathematics and had five parts of different sizes from large to small. Each of these was then carved as similar decreasing forms.
As a main structure I made Mobius strips in the form of infinity symbols. Their continuous surfaces looping around to become a two faced object.

What goes around comes around

At their heart was a structure based on the rungs in DNA symbolising the genetic code where all these subtle changes are recorded. The placement of the five was to show that although getting smaller the process will still continue.

It was nice to work in this historic city and create a bit of temporary art which seemed very fitting in the frozen surrounds. The addition of the bronze deer to the composition wasn't really intentional but it gave the location a very natural feel and it was like my sculpture was another naturally occurring object in the landscape.

I placed tealight candles in a circle around the piece for the photos. I thought the warm light coming through the ice would be a nice contrast in the frozen scene.

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Ps

This is the first time I use the #stem tag, I thought that because this is very much a sculpture about an important science I would give it a try and hopefully introduce my work to new eyes. I have always thought that artists and scientists are using what tools they have to try and understand the world better. If anyone has a problem with me doing so please let me know in the comments and I will remove it.

Thanks for reading. I use Steem to document my work as an ephemeral Sculptor of sand, snow and ice, among other things. This will hopefully give it a new life on the Steem blockchain. Below you will find some of my recent posts.

Disjointed - ice sculpture

The bold and the beautiful - ice sculpture

You may kiss the bride - ice sculpture

I hope you'll join me again soon
@ammonite