ROCK TALK
MONTOYA SCULPTURE & SUPPLY since 1973

Interesting sculpture related news, technical tips, special offers and other important information
By Jeff Halverson
Sculptor and Owner of Montoya Sculpture & Supply
www.MontoyaSculpture.com

February 25, 2004
Issue 8
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IN THIS ISSUE:
1. Editor's Note
2. Interview with Kennedy Musekiwa of Zimbabwe- Instructor for March 8-11
3. Malvina Hoffman – Part 3 Working with Malvina by Vince Ricci
4. Current Sale
5. Upcoming Events
6. Please send sculpture quotes (maybe win $25 gift certificate)

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SCULPTURE QUOTE

“Fill a space in a beautiful way” Georgia O'Keeffe

Submitted by
Merlin L Cohen (http://www.merlincohen.com/).
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1. EDITOR'S NOTE

We were at ArtiGras a week ago were we were demonstrating stone carving. Both Kennedy Musekiwa and Vince Ricci were demonstrating. Both of them have upcoming workshops listed below. A lot of people stop and look at the work in progress. I wish more of them would take the time to actually try for themselves and create something out of stone. Next year I am going to see about putting up a hands on demonstration area so those interested can touch the tools and stone and see what it feels like to work in stone.

Hope you like the selected quote. I really like this one because while a painter said it, it also speaks to sculptors, perhaps more so to sculptors than any other artist. It was selected from a list submitted by Merlin Cohen. Check out his website for some beautiful abstract and figurative works (http://www.merlincohen.com/). We are sending Merlin the $25 Gift Certificate in appreciation. By the looks of Merlin's website the gift certificate will be put to good use.

We have posted the latest list of Sculpture Quotes on the home page of the website www.MontoyaSculpture.com . Please check it out and let me know what you think,
And of course the hunt goes on for more quotes. Please send me ones you find.
We have also posted the last seven issues of the newsletter so if you want to look at past articles they are all there.

On January 27th we had our free drawing for the Sculpture Workshop with Enzo Torcoletti. I am sorry to report that the winner was not able to attend. We are sending him a consolation prize. Drawings for the 19th Season Sculpture Workshop will be held earlier in the season so that the selected winner can have additional time to plan to attend.

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2. Interview with Kennedy Musekiwa (KM) by Jeff Halverson (JH)

Together with www.sandawana.com,

Kennedy is now working at the studio in West Palm Beach. He was at ArtiGras in North Palm Beach demonstrating his sculpture techniques. Kennedy will be instructing Shona Sculpture Workshop for four days March 8-11. Three spaces left.

JH- Kennedy, please tell me little about what got you into sculpture?
KW- I was first inspired by toy making under the tutelage of my cousin, Victor Mtongwizo. Later, by the first generation elder sculptor Joseph Ndandarika (a world acclaimed master sculptor). I dedicated myself as a full time stone sculptor making exquisite small pieces, which I take great pride in.

JH- Please tell me about your artistic education and experience.
KW- I went to an art school in Marondera near Harare where I was doing odd jobs, like sanding and polishing, then later my brother Victor Mtongwizo who was a senior sculptor inspired me to be a full time sculptor.

JH- I know that last year after visiting and teaching at Montoya for a few months you went on to other teaching opportunities. Tell us about them.
KW- Yes, I went to Utah were I teach workshops, for at least a month. People were very happy about my teachings. This show was for the Utah Council, to educate children on the richness of human excellence and the creative expression through the arts.

JH- Last year you conducted a 5-day stone sculpture workshops at Montoya in West Palm Beach. The student evaluations came back with great comments about your work and approach. What do you try to accomplish with your participants?
KW-I found that all my students were talented artists in their own way, and I try to show them how to make sculptures using what they see around them. I try to encourage them to take time to accomplish the job at hand. It takes patience and time to work on Zimbabwean stone.

JH- Tell me about a teacher, artist or event that most influences your sculpture style.
KW- It is hard to describe how wonderful a teacher is; a teacher should be very kind and obedient. A teacher should demonstrate while students are looking on. My wife and children, influence my art. When I see the love that my wife has for our family, it makes me want to express the joy I feel. I also find inspiration in the people around me.

JH- Tell us a little about Shona sculpture. What makes it unique?
KW- Shona sculpture is unique in the sense that stresses importance on family values and nature around us. Our ancestors from generation to generation were very much artistic and there is lot of unique stones around Zimbabwe. (The name Zimbabwe means the House of Stone in the Shona language). The Shona people are the largest indigenous group in Zimbabwe. They were peaceful farmers who have survived colonization, invaders, diseases and drought.

JH- If you had to pick just one, what would be your favorite subject for sculpture and why?
KW- My favorite subject is human expressions, because I believe that everything on earth contains everyday life. That is why my work is primarily based on human expression.

JH- Kennedy, what sculpture large or small, remains to be done by you?
KW- I would like to quarry raw stone with a pickaxe. I will be looking for a stone double the size of a human being. I hope to have that particular piece exhibited in either the Rodin Museum in Paris or The Museum of Mankind as a permanent collection.

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3. Malvina Hoffman - Part 3 by Vince Ricci

Working with Malvina:

My encounter and opportunity to work with Malvina Hoffman came at a time in my life when I had been working almost exclusively with clay modeling and drawing. I was enrolled at The National Academy of Design and had been awarded scholarships. I was working with my teacher, Michael Lance, on a commission for the Pan American World Health Building in Washington, D.C. About the same time I became acquainted with the sculptor Donald DeLue who I would later work with at his studios in New Jersey. I felt myself to be an accomplished clay modeler, who had already had some success. When I look back on that time and see old photos of my earliest works I realize how my teachers were kind and understanding. Nevertheless, Malvina seemed to believe in me and saw my future as a sculptor. I remember her showing me a picture of her first figure in clay that made me feel hopeful. I would have to write a book on clay modeling techniques to explain all that I learned from Malvina about clay modeling. However, I can share with you my first attempt to impress her with my skills and some of the important insights she gave me.

Several weeks after I had started working with Malvina she asked me if I wanted to do any of my own work at her studio where she could watch me work and give me some feed back, “Inspiration” as she called it. I was delighted; before long I had set up an armature to model clay. She was not inspired. She quickly singled out all the possible problems I might encounter while modeling on it's surface, saying the armature should be considered as part of the sculpture from the very start, not just a supporting structure, Within the human body, the skeleton is a living part of the figure, just as an armature is an integral part of a sculpture. After making corrections, looking at the armature from all the possible directions that I would be modeling from, and making the necessary allowances for the transmission of dynamic internal gestures that is so necessary to give a life force to figurative work, I felt I was ready to begin. To understand this transmission of dynamic internal gestures is so important that it cannot be understated. It represents, in sculpture, the element and anticipation of future movements or time. It gives even the most apparently still composition the inherent sense for movement, both past and future. Which of course is intrinsic in all life. I presented the results of my more than one-hour struggle for perfection to her for review. This seemed to be satisfactory to her.
If I had learned nothing more that day it would have been enough, but there was more to come.
Consequently, I had to start modeling with clay. Both Malvina and I used sculpture clay that is made with an oil base, Roma Plastilina, when I started to use the clay, I would take a small piece roll it between my fingers and then apply it. She waited a little while and then said “I always prepare my clay before I start working” Taking a large amount of clay in her hands she rolled it into large sausage size lumps and when they where well worked and pliable she laid them down close at hand, at the side of the armature. Saying “ I like to work quickly and not have to take much time getting the clay ready each time I want to put some on the armature.” As always I followed her method and found it was helpful, forcing me to take a chance, to do something different. The day went by, and I learned. Each day I spent with her was more or less like that day, and I came to believe Malvina was challenging me to think for myself, She never let me forget that I had asked to work with her, the great artist, now I had to show her I deserved the right to be there.
Everything was learned and relearned; at times I thought I would never get it right.
As for insights, one day she asked me what I thought about the contemporary art scene. I should say that at the time I had not paid much attention to art history and had little understanding of the contemporary art scene. My exposure and tendencies were centered on my Italian European heritage and classical figurative imagery. At first sight Malvina's works have so much of that character and her experiences with Rodin that it is easy for me to think she would not like what was currently being done. I wasn't sure how to answer her and I said so. What followed was impressive to me because her openness and willingness to look at and see the possibilities were outside of my own experiences. She always surprised me with unexpected possibilities. My awareness of Malvina's openness has little to do with the actual process of clay modeling, but it does have a great deal to do with making art. Most appreciably in respect to my own ability to move away from the idea that the only way forward was to follow some academic worldview of how art is made. Her openness helped me understand that it was possible to have sight but at the same time to be without vision.

There are many stories, and moments that I cannot tell you about in this brief sketch of the time I spent with Malvina, without making this into a book. But here are just a few of our personal exchanges that I can share at this time. Understanding Malvina would not be complete without the understanding of how charismatic she was. Her personal presence and charisma was such that I invited a dear friend to come and have tea with us. My friend, who was from a fine family with exposure to many powerful people and was at the time a French-speaking guide at the United Nations in New York City, came for a visit. After tea and pleasant chat, it was time for her to depart. She was so overwhelmed by Malvina, that when it was time for her to get up and leave the “Eagles Nest”, my friend started walking backward toward the doorway. She expressed her pleasure to have had the opportunity to meet Malvina, as though she was in the presence of royalty, inadvertently bumping into and tipping over a small table to her great embarrassment. No damage was done and she was able to escape without further incident. Malvina's only comment was “she is very nice, attractive, but a bit clumsy”.
In time and as I got to know her, I learned that Malvina wasn't a very religious person, but she was deeply spiritual, almost a mystic. She would tell me how her dreams influenced her work. She would give me details of every aspect of “the visions” which she often turned into sculpture. She often sounded like she thought she had some kind of contact with the sprits of those who had passed over to the other side of the River Styx, as she called it.

Soon after her death I started to understand better what it was she was trying to tell me. Malvina had given me many of her tools and a few she had gotten form Rodin. Later on as I worked and used them I started to think about the tools and how she and Rodin had once used them and how prized they were. So as I would work with them I would start to have little one-way conversations with them both. Saying things like, “well what do you think, “ or “Thanks, Malvina”. Over the years I have included great personalities like Michelangelo and others. Malvina showed me that art is like a great river that flows through time. It is the measure of time and humanity's reflections of itself; it's wonders, beauty, misfortune and possibilities. Meeting and working with Malvina allowed me the good fortune of entering into that river at an early stage of my life as an artist. The lessons learned gave me the understanding that I am a part of something much bigger then myself. I am just one of many. Thank you Malvina, for teaching me humility that allowed me to learn from you and all the others that came before us. Malvina taught me to work hard, be true to myself, trust my instinct, be open, and enjoy the waters of the great river of art. My time with Malvina came to an end one day when we were up in the “Eagles Nest” with Malvina and we were having one of our discussions about something or other, and out of the blue she said, “ I have waited a long time for you to come into my life, and I think you are ready, I think you should go to France, would you like to go to the Beaux Arts? I'll have Golda write you a letter. It is time for me to cross over the River Styx.” I am leaving out some of the discourse, but within two weeks Malvina was dead.

With Malvina's death and the coming of spring of the same year I was on my way to Paris to enter the Beaux Arts, where new people and a new story begins.

However, I need to I finish my account of sculptors, like Donald DeLue and Michael Lance, whom I worked with while I lived in New York City,

Next in my upcoming Chapters: Working with DeLue and Lance.

About the writer Vincent M. Ricci:
Vincent was born in New Haven, CT. His parents were both Italian. He studied first as a painter and then moved to New York City, were he started working and studying sculpture. He attended The Art Students League, and The National Academy of Design, where he was awarded scholarships. After working with several outstanding sculptors, Vincent opened a studio in Greenwich Village. After a few years and exhibits, he applied to the Ecole de Beaux Arts in Paris and was conditionally accepted. Vincent was a constant visitor to the Rodin museum and spent many hours in the many great museums of Paris. He completed his exams at the Beaux Arts and remained there for a year. Whereupon he moved to Italy and entered The Academia di Belli Arti where he completed a four-year degree program. At the Accadamia he met and later studied with Emilio Greco, Giacomo Manzu and many others who he kept company with and with whom he exchanged his views. Upon completion of the Accadamia he lived and worked in Italy for and additional year with success. He returned to NY and then on to Boston where he taught at New England School Of Art, as the Dean of Students, Boston University, where he helped write the foundations study program, and at The School Of The Museum Of Fine Arts, as a permanent member of the teaching staff for 20 Years. Vincent is the founder of The Center For The Arts at Villa Maria, one of the longest surviving sculpture and fine arts studies abroad programs, which was established in 1984. Currently, he conducts workshops in Italy, in Palm Beach, Florida at Montoya Sculpture & Supplies and in St. Petersburg, FL at his studio.

Vince will be at Montoya to conduct his next 4 day workshop on March 31-April 3.

A few issues ago I had one of Malvina Hoffman's books called “Sculpture Inside & Out” printed in 1939. I have another one, check below under current sale if you want to order it.

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4. CURRENT SALE

“Sculpture Inside & Out” by Malvina Hoffman original 1939 book. Still a classic. When I have it I usually sell it at $55. For this issue $45, plus shipping. Call us at 561-832-4401. I only have one. Also you might want to check out the other sculpture related old and out of print books in the Product Catalog under “books, antique”. There are no pictures of them and no write up as I only have one of each. Call us with the title and ID# for more information.

We are sending out a small sale card in the next week. We have a large stock of stone and we just got another 10 tons of new stone in. There is some great looking honeycomb calcite as well as purple wonderstone (not a solid color, but very nice with shades of purple throughout). And we have white alabaster boulders. There is more but you will see them in the sales card. If you signed up for the newsletter through the website you were not asked for a mailing address. If you want us to have your mailing address you may email it to us at info@MontoyaSculpture.com.

GIFT CERTIFICATES – We have gift certificates available in $25 increments. Tell your family and friends that's what you really want, so you can pick what you want. Easy to buy, mail, and use.
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5. UPCOMING EVENTS

Our Next Stone Carving Workshop

STONE CARVING, FINISHING, JOINING AND LAMINATING
February 26-29, Hands-on Carving Workshop, 4- day
ENZO TORCOLETTI returns for his 11th season. A full time Flagler College sculpture professor of 30 years, and summer Italy resident he brings a current and power tool driven approach to stone sculpture. Using alabaster or marble, Enzo works with beginner and experienced participants in the development of classical, figurative and abstract forms. His innovative approach to sculpture helps his students make the most of their sculptural vision. Interesting sessions on stone joining and laminating to add interest to your sculpture. And learn how to make those Italian paper hats worn by Italian artigani.
A concentrated and idea filled workshop. Limited to10 participants. You will enjoy the energy and creativity of Enzo's workshop.
FEB 26-29, Thur-Sun 9:00-5:00 (with evening hours upon class request), four full days [$395] call 561-832-4401 to reserve your place.
Get to know Enzo, read Issue 5 of our eNewsletter (online) for his interview
----AS OF THIS WRITING THERE ARE TWO SPACES AVAILABLE-

SHONA SCULPTURE CARVING
4-day workshop with visiting sculptor from Zimbabwe, KENNEDY MUSEKIWA. Work in African stone or other stone of your choice, with 3rd Generation Master Carver who has exhibited in Europe, Canada, US, and Batswana. Lear the basic elements of Shona sculpture as well as explore texture and finishing techniques. Beginner to advanced.
MAR 8-11, Mon-Thur (9-5) 4 days [$395], Limited to 10 participants. Read his interview in this newsletter Issue 8. A rare opportunity. Register early to save your place. See his works at www.sandawanagallery.com.
----AS OF THIS WRITING THERE ARE THREE SPACES AVAILABLE

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6. PLEASE SEND SCULPTURE QUOTES (maybe win $25 gift certificate)

I have included a sculpture related quote at the top of this issue. I hope it is inspiring and interesting. If you have an interesting sculpture related quote please send it to me. Please include the name of the person who said it. All of the quotes that are sent are being compiled into a list of quotes related to sculpture that I will soon be posting on the Montoya website. I would appreciate your help in building this list of quotes directly related to sculpture. Quotes can be from recognized sculptors of the past or from a teacher or friend. Send me your sculpture related quote, and if it is selected I will send you a Montoya Sculpture & Supply $25 gift certificate and put the quote in the next issue. Email me at Jeff@MontoyaSculpture.com

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(c)Copyright 2004 Jeff Halverson