July 5th, 2010
Check out this creepazoid. He (?) is called the S.L.E. Creature, and once I get over being freaked out, I feel really bad for … it. Poor thing, you look at it and just know this is someone who’s had a really serious problem.
The S.L.E. Creature is a new release from
Artist Proof Studio, sculpted by Norman Meyers, 32, of Santa Monica, Calif. Here’s how Norm describes the creature’s origin:
“A strange virus takes over its host mutating them into a twisted deformed being.
“During the mutation process, the virus allows the host’s face to appear and look at its new body, the virus being proud of its work.
“When the host/victim inevitably freaks out, the head is re-absorbed and the virus gets to work creating an even more horrifying mutation. It’s an endless cycle.”
What bothers and impresses me when I look at some of Norm’s work is that I can see the person underneath all that weirdness, maybe someone who didn’t deserve to end up how he is.
You can say similar things about some of the pieces by Paul Komoda, Norm’s partner in Artist Proof Studio, who created an Elephant Man bust slated for release soon.
Norm’s mother and sister are established fine artist figure painters who regularly have solo shows throughout Los Angeles and galleries on the East Coast. Check out their work online at
www.neilahmeyers.com and
www.pattimeyers.com.
His father enjoyed sculpting, mostly figurative, working in water clay, bronze and stone.…
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June 1st, 2010
On his
Facebook page, Troy McDevitt describes his business,
The McDevitt Studio, as “a magical place. For the past several years, I’ve laid a lump of clay out on my workbench before going to bed at night and in the morning, someone has used it to sculpt a brand new statue! This is where all my cake toppers and other sculpts have come from.
“Once, my wife and I hid in the closet and we saw that it was, in fact, two adorable little elves that sneak in and create these wonderful little sculpts for us as we sleep. She suggested that, as a way of repaying them, we should make them some little pants and shirts and shoes, since they were barefoot and the clothes they wore were all dirty and tattered. It was getting very, very cold outside and she felt this was the least we could do for all that they’ve done for us.
“I told her to keep her stupid suggestions to herself and that the cold air would help keep them awake. Call for pricing!”
Plainly, Troy approaches his work with a sense of humor and his work reflects it. Just look at one of his latest pieces, “Charge!”, a licensed 1/6 scale reproduction of a painting from British artist Aly Fell. Commissioned by Marc Havican of Space City Resin, “Charge!” is a perfect translation of the artwork into three dimensions, a wonderful sculpture that’s both sexy and…
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April 1st, 2010
Look at the faces on some of these characters. Demon of the Harvest. Crookneck. Jack the Ripper. Even little Alice, concealing silverware as she awaits Humpty Dumpty’s fall. The characters look so
happy, and they’re all obviously so
nasty.
Welcome to the worlds of Robert Blair, a sculptor who knows our childhood fantasies are only a breath away from our childhood nightmares.
A craftsman shapes wood into a boy, and that creation magically comes to life. Would this child be the sweet but musically mischievous rascal Walt Disney envisioned, or would he be Robert Blair’s creaky, splintery, grasping monster? I liked the cartoon version when I was younger, but now I get a bigger kick out of the chiller Robert calls Gepetto’s Nightmare.
Robert’s work is so familiar, yet so different. His Garden Gnome has the beard, tall hat and outfit you expect, but this little guy is dangerous. His Nosferatu shares the bald pate, long nails and robe of all Max Schrek figures, but it creaks with extra age, malice, and long, weird arms. You
wish his Cheshire Cat would turn invisible so you wouldn’t have to look at that nasty, wrinkled thing.
Robert Blair, 53, lives in Aylmer, Quebec, a small town just outside Ottawa. He worked as a hairstylist for 32 years, but retired from that. In addition to sculpting, he molds and casts, and produces his works, available to fans through his website,
blairsculpture.ca. He has also painted most of his own pieces.
To…
Read the rest Filed under Comics, Historial, Monsters, Resin, Sculptors | Tags: blair, crookneck, jack the ripper, through the looking glass | 1 Comment » |
December 1st, 2009
The Head Merchant. What a name for a character. When he lumbered onto the garage-kit scene a couple years ago, I was struck by both his originality and his familiarity. The character is a cheerful but deadly, axe-toting barbarian on the back of a …
whatever that horned creature is, packing a bouncing supply of severed heads. If someone told me this was an image that flowed from the paintbrushes of Frank Frazetta, I would have believed it.
But it’s not Frazetta’s work. It was created by sculptor Kent Kidwell, and for many hobbyists it was a memorable introduction.
Kent Kidwell, 40, lives in Florence, Ariz. He’s married to Linda and has four kids, Chessa, 4, Gabriel, 6, Kaleb, 14, and Samantha, 17. His business is
Kidwell Concepts, which offers sculpting, mold-making, casting, design and multimedia. Running his business is a full-time endeavor for Kent; he says it’s all he knows how to do.
“Sadly, almost 20 years of sculpting, mold making and casting has made me unqualified for normal employment,” he said. “I would get fired at Taco Bell, I would get caught making a zombie bust made of beans and that would be it.”
The majority of his clients are private buyers who want unique fine art for home use, some office, but he has done work for larger companies as well.
“Being so young in the resin kit industry, I have just focused on releasing original kits,” he said. He’d like to do familiar characters such…
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September 3rd, 2009
The impression I get is that Fritz Frising,
“The Headless Hearseman”, could happily start his day watching his 4-year-old son, Andi, put Band-Aids on his monster models’ ouchies, move on to a comfortable tea-time chat with a WWII veteran’s 88-year-old widow, then finish up late discussing deathrock icons in the heart of a group most men in their early 40s would go out of their way to avoid.
A blend of past and present, courtesy and peril, elegance and roughness, plus a healthy dose of talent, that’s how Fritz strikes me … much like
Monstrology Models, which Fritz has resurrected.
Monstrology originally rose in the 1990s under founder Jon Wang. “I was a huge horror movie fan and Aurora monster model builder since I was a little kid,” Jon said in an e-mail interview. “At the Fangoria and Chiller shows of the late ’80s and early ’90s I saw incredible sculptures by guys like John Dennett, Thomas Kuntz, Yagher and Bowen and of course the Billiken stuff — and was inspired to start sculpting.
“I hadn’t really planned on starting a company, but things just spiraled and eventually Monstrology was born — the idea being the ‘study’ of these horror characters through sculpture.”
The company produced more than its share of early garage-kit classics, particularly a handful of figures sculpted by William Paquet, “who did what I consider to be some of his best work for Monstrology,” Fritz said via e-mail.
Those figures include a John Barrymore Mr.…
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