Cape Dorset sculpture studio :: a proposal
Tammy Allison
t he process of carving begins with the selection of the stone. The stone is selected, with a carving in mind, or the shape of the stone inspires the carving. A clear idea of the final sculp- ture must be in view before cutting the stone. Roughing out consists of cutting away and filing large amounts of stone to reveal the shape of the piece at work. This is an outdoor task, because of the dust created from removing the stone. The rough image is hacked out using saws, axes, hammers, chisels and electrical grinders. Once the initial roughing out stage is completed, the detailing is done with chisels, small files, rasps, penknives or nails and grinding bits attached to electrical drills. To smooth the carving, sandpaper is used, commencing with a rough grade and working down to a fine grade. The stone is dipped into water in the latter sanding stages for wet-sanding, where the rich deep colour and the high polish of the finished sculpture is revealed. The techniques of every artist vary, just as do their backgrounds: men and women, old and young. They all live in the same environment and are told similar stories, but their work de- picts their own expressions of their northern world and are observed in galleries and personal collections throughout the world. I this project, the movement of working around a stone was studied to tell the story of how carving is physically done. The minimal form that is created from these studies illustrates the space that is required for carving at the scale of a person. Heat was used to explore carving with thermal qualities — a flame was placed in snow to illustrate how a space can be carved from heat. The movement and heat studies were combined, using the carving as the heat source. The movement and thermal studies can be applied to architecture as the program of the building inhabits the form. With the act of carving as the focal point of the studies, the architecture can be developed to embody qualities of space, intensity of heat (and therefore change in form) from duration, density and interaction.
North of the Hudson Bay, at 64 de- grees latitude, a community of 1,200 people live on a small island off the southern coast of Baffin Island. There is no road access to Cape Dorset, it is reached only by boat or plane. Provi- sions for the community are sent via sea-lift once or twice during the short summer thaw, anything else must be flown in at a higher cost. Today Cape Dorset is the home of some of the world’s greatest Inuit artists. There are approximately 70-90 carv- ers in Cape Dorset, 5-10 of which are female. Generally the carvers of Cape Dorset work from their homes year round, removing most of the stone outside and detailing and finishing the piece inside the house. The built envi- ronment consists mainly of wooden and metal boxes, arranged along gravel roads, in the midst of a vast and barren Arctic land. The beauty of the surrounding landscape, the harsh environment or the culture of the people are rarely expressed in the architecture.
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architecture and land
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