2001 Vauxhall Corsa, cast iron, bronze leaf, Kidwelly Industrial Museum, Wales, 2010 (4’9” x 5’3” x 12’3”)

Cast on site at the 6th International Conference of Contemporary Cast Iron Art. (Red Dragon Furnace) Furnace Director: Andy Griffiths, Pour Captain: Chris Keating, Pour Assistants: Toma Villa and (), Furnace operators: (), Mold production assistants: Miles Browne, Jessica MacWithey, Carissa Samaniego, Aga Sulek and Toma Villa

Contributors

Berllanderi Sculpture Workshop and the Arts Council of Wales

St. Catherine University Academic Community Development Committee Faculty Research Undergraduate Program Grant and Travel Grant

St. Catherine University Abigail Quigley McCarthy Center for Women

St. Catherine University Student Senate

Starseed Foundation

Karin and Richard Ringler

West Wales School of the Arts

Special Thanks to: Harvey and Sue Hood, Justine Johnson, Deborah LaGrasse, Matthew Tomalin, Andy Griffiths, Toma Villa, Jessica MacWithey, Chris Keating, Aga Sulek, Miles Browne, Carissa Samaniego, Maris Strautmanis and Lauris Strautmanis

 

 

 

First Pour - Chris Keating and ? on ladle (Image courtesy of Geraint Jones)

Sparks - Toma Villa (pictured) and Chris Keating on ladle (Image courtesy of Geraint Jones)

Carp - (Image courtesy of Justine Johnson)

Palus Somnii (Marsh of Sleep) (6-8) was cast during the 6th International Conference of Contemporary Cast Iron Art in Kidwelly, Wales in July 2010. Using a stripped Vauxhall Corsa as a flask, molten iron was poured directly into the vehicle’s interior. The act of the pour itself, or “Transmission,” was intended to redescribe the car in relation to the material of its own creation and our own experience. The public iron pour presented an elemental material and an ordinary vehicle as explosive spectacle, similar to the explosive introduction of petroleum into our culture and environment.  Once unmolded, the car and its interior forms of a Mississippi River carp and giant horsetails became a narrative about cars and their relationship to the environment; specifically their reliance on fossil fuels derived from primordial sources and our reliance on increasingly scarce and environmentally destructive fuel resources.