Art in the Garden: Henry Null of The Romantic Garden

Long time Eye of the Day customer Henry Null of The Romantic Garden Company recently installed three Italian terracotta Sako balls in a Santa Barbara garden. The three globes, provided by Eye of the Day,  were custom colored by the company’s Service department. Null describes the project: “The Italian terra cotta Sako balls were rolled into place at the terraced garden we built in Santa Barbara. We had Eye of the Day epoxy-paint them to my color instructions (I wanted something close to the sky color to represent the universe.) But I also wanted the globes to break up the linear pattern of the texanum hedge. At the same time I wanted the globes to repeat a pattern of 3’s that I was constructing vertically with plants of Thuja occidentalis. Sound complicated? Well, it was.

One further general point about artistic objects in the garden:  to be effective, they should be distinctive or displayed in some distinctive way.  It should be the customer’s option, as a matter of personal taste.”

On another garden from years before, Null relates an example of using unique objects in the garden: “Years ago I worked for the late Margaret Mallory on Ortega Ridge. She was an art collector and in her garden a five-foot pedestal supported a beat-up metal gyroscope which was maybe 18 inches in diameter. I asked her about it and her reply was, “that gyroscope was on the last British gunship in Palestine.’ You don’t get much more distinctive than that. We don’t have any spare, war-weary gyroscopes hanging around, but we have a selection of odd garden ornaments that can be used for focal points.”

Null’s recent venture The Avant Garden Company “offers a unique perspective to gardening by providing a philosophical and metaphorical approach. Each aspect of the garden is strategically designed and formed to create a celestial garden piece.”

To view more of Henry’s work, please visit The Avant Garden Company and The Romantic Garden Company.

Custom finishes are a specialty at Eye of the Day. Please visit our website for more information.

MUSINGS UN DESIGN: SCULPTOR BOBBIE CARLYLE

We have been extremely fortunate to exhibit many of Bobbie Carlyle’s  bronze sculptures at Eye of the Day in our showroom and our outdoor areas for the last year.  Last month brought this internationally recognized sculptor from Colorado to Carpinteria to take part in our Art in the Garden and Water Conservation weekend.

About the Artist

This tiny, quiet blonde woman produces an incredible array of sculptures including wildlife, figurative, fantasy and historical figures. Bobbie spent much of her time during her three days with us working on a new sculpture, showing us how much quiet diligence it takes to create something physical from an idea.

One of Bobbie’s most well known sculptures is “Self Made Man,” a man carving himself out of stone, “carving his character, carving his future.”  This 14’ monument is a great example of  Bobbie’s vision.  She recently installed a piece in Los Angeles called “Seaswept” at one of the entrances of the new Robert F. Kennedy Inspiration Park, the former site of the Ambassador Hotel and we have the same beautiful sculpture here at Eye of the Day.

Our showroom and annex holds many pieces of Bobbie’s garden art: a tiny fairy sitting atop a mushroom, a young baseball catcher crouching behind an excited batter, a boy leaping to catch a frog and a life-size girl holding her day’s catch, a tiny minnow, and with her can of worms at her side.

Behind the Art

After looking at her website and then having the opportunity to see so many of Bobbie’s pieces, I was interested in finding out what would happen next in the process of creating a full size sculpture from the lovely little figure she was sculpting at Eye of the Day.

She first creates the figure in modeling clay in order to get the proportions and stance the way she wants them. A mold is then made first in latex or silicone backed with plaster to hold the shape. The clay is removed and molten wax is poured into the mold and cooled, after which the wax is removed and coated with ten coats of silica gel, dried and fired in a kiln in which the wax melts and the silica becomes a ceramic shell. 2200° molten bronze is poured into the now empty shell.  After cooling, the bronze is cleaned by sandblasting, welding, metal chasing. And there you have it… finished.

Curiosity quenched.

To learn more about the artist and to view Bobbie’s work, please visit Bobbie Carlyle Sculpture.