Jydam

The bronze sculpture for 2015, Jydam.  She has a bit of a classical Greco-Roman flair.  I finished up the last of the small stuff on the sculpt yesterday.  Even though I don't think she's totally finished, (there is never a sculpture in existence that is totally finished...)  she's as close as she's gonna get to being done in my book.  I'm happy with the outcome.  The sculpt is in white primer form at the moment, but I think that she'll look really good when she's done in a traditional bronze patina - and also polished metal bronze form - with a marble base. 

There's also a special thank you to my friend Eishan for helping me to translate and correctly spell the name in the native language.  One of the dictionaries had the name mis-spelled with a "C" (Cydam) when in reality the native speakers pronounce it with a "J" instead.  Makes me wonder if us western speakers are butchering the native Turkmen horses names when we register them...

But now that the sculpt is done, I just have to get my butt in gear and sell a crapload of models in order to pay for the foundry mold and casting.  Yay!

"Jydam" meaning patience in Turkmen.  Small shoulder bust, sculpture measures roughly 5.75" x 6" inches in size.

Battle In The Saddle I

Nettie and I attended the first show of the local Battle In The Saddle winter series on Saturday in Pendleton.  We did the ranch horse classes, which was a lot of fun.  Craig stopped by at around 11 a.m. and took this photo of the cute yellow sweetheart.  =:)  She's so adorable.

Two custom stablemate minis recently completed in the studio, owned by Amanda Ingram of Illinois. 

A couple of photos from Smidgen's kindergarten sessions.

Photo from our ride today.  Smidgen and I heading to the river.

Just finished up two medallions for my personal collection.  =:)  Fun!

Here is a photo of the original version, sculpted by Russian artist Oxana Kuks.

I painted the first one as a metallic sooty palomino sabino.  I resculpted the tail to be swishing to the left side towards the flowers, and I also smoothed down the textured background area.

The second one I painted as a dark sooty buckskin sabino.  I wanted to see what the sculpture would look like without the flowers, so I customized it to be without them.  I kind-of like how it turned out - it draws more attention towards the eye of the horse and makes the subject appear larger.   

Videos of Irahm and Octopelle, autumn 2015. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sZd-tDakH00

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0E2-6ZrD9Uw