Dream Series - Horse - 6"

The Dreamtime series -





The art of paleo man has always been an influence on my work. But in the last year more and more things were coming into my "life feed" (like one's Facebook news feed) which asked some very compelling questions about the reason we as a species began creating art. Books, news articles, YouTube videos attempting to answer the why's of strange specifics about these. Many of the answers were not satisfying to me as they came from science. And while I'm a huge fan-boy of all things science; in my opinion science was not a complete tool for studying art. In my exploration I found that the QUESTIONS were far more amazing than than the answers. And I believe good science and good art are best when they raise more and better questions than they are when they give us tidy answers.

Some of the questions:
Why did humans change relatively suddenly in a period of 30,000 to 40,000 years ago a begin making art when they'd not done so for 200,000 years prior to this?
Why would art done during different times over 10,000 years and separated by 100's of kilometers have virtually identical styles and methods?
Why did they go deep into caves, in the dark, sometimes over a kilometer into the most difficultly accessible part of a cave to make the works?
Why are the subject animals of a select few species of primarily game animals? (No fish. Not insects. Not smaller animals like rabbit and squirrel. No plants. No humans during this time period, nor other hominids we lived beside like Neanderthal or Denisovans.) 
Why were the animals floating, overlapping, and in seemingly random axis? They weren't standing on grass, on rocks, fixed in a landscape.)
And more that I will not touch upon here.

To me it seems probable that this art wasn't just a byproduct of culture, but something foundational to what we call our "mind". Consciousness, sentience, self awareness as we know it has its roots here. In other words- that which makes us who we are...what we are... who I am and what I am -all has its genesis here.

It hits me particularly hard as I have always had my dreams populated with animals, and animals of similar ilk to what early man depicted. And they also fly, float, morph shape and character, in a very similar way to how the works of early man are depicted.

It compelled my to explore. In these, I hope to pluck a string on a musical instrument (me) and see if the other strings (everyone else) resonate in harmony with that first plucked string. 

At very first I named the series "The Dreamtime" after the Austral Aboriginal mythology of the same name. It wasn't exact, but is was closest to what I was envisioning and thinking. I began searching for a common thread in other first people's beliefs for clues, but later I realized the title itself held clues. The connection with my aforementioned dreams of floating deer, flying elk, and fog lions was made of course. But then greater connection to my reading of the cave descriptions where the art is found and questions about that- deep down, in the earth, in dark...almost like the dreams that inhabit the recesses of our psyche deep in our minds and only come to life in darkness of our sleep. The Dreamtime- it has something to do with this, I believe. An invocation? A recreation? An implanting of their dreamtimes in the mind of the mother earth? I'll leave those questions there, a sort of cliff hanger...because as I said before, I think instead of trying to find definitive answers, I'm trying to find better questions.

With my bias as a bronze sculptor, I combined my own flight of fancy with the big "what if" of what if during this time we discover that ancient man had stumbled upon the "magic" of the metal casting process. (Not as big of a leap as one might think once they read about the Great Lakes Copper Culture of early first peoples in the Midwest of Northern Michigan/Wisconsin btw.) So began my explorations eschewing my 44 years of attempting to master the metal casting process to create perfect castings. Where I had spent so much effort and study expelling the demons and gremlins of metal casting defects; I instead went as primitive and low tech as possible for my starting point. I not only abandoned good foundry technique and science, I vandalized it, graffiti-ed it, then pushed it into the ditch and set fire to it. I am trying to replicate how ancient people's would have done it, as much as is possible. (I hope to strip it down and minimize tech as much as possible in the future.)  I went back to a starting point of plaster based investments in low temperature kilns. I am deliberately culturing casting defects, and inviting them to become equal partners in my creative process. All of the casting defects that make good foundrymen tear their hair out- I am culturing. Insufficiently burning out my investment molds so the wax residues cause gas. Using investment techniques which cause minor surface spalling which delivers micro flashings on surfaces. Misruns that cause legs and tails to not cast completely. I now deliberately create the work with these in mind- I leave blank smooth areas on the wax and let the gremlins use it as a blank canvas on which to paint their abstract genius. I place rocks, copper wire, botanical elements (leaves, buds, blossoms and seeds) into the wax and directly burn them out. I have begun to get a feel for how to actually fine tune my techniques to culture and nurture certain specific defects- alligator skin, a gas defect that resembles a Pollock painting, and more precise shrinkage defect placement. It's all very freeing, empowering, invigorating.




A few other notes about The Dreamtime series:
ALL works are one of a kind originals. There are no molds. No editions. Don't ask for another of a piece you saw and loved- I can't...and won't. I have some that are similar interesting pieces and themes, so another of similar size, style, patina, or treatment may be done in the future or by request- but it will never be exactly like one previously done. Once a piece is sold- it's sold, gone, say good night Gracy.


Each piece is hand crafted in wax over a plaster core. And I do mean HAND crafted. My substantial investment in modern loop tools for working clay - all sit idle in a box. I use my fingers, and a "set" of about a half dozen sharpened sticks to create these as ancient man would have done.
There is no welding on the metal. I have dabbled in soldering a couple times, but don't like it...it just doesn't "fit" or feel right. I have done a few things with primitive fabrication to attach a part here or there, but generally if some part doesn't cast I leave it as such. (I think the worst of these would still be objects of magic, fascination, and wonder to our ancestors had they actually done this.)
I have had to make some concessions in technology applied to the metal- if I did not I would only be able to make perhaps 6 pieces a year, and would have to charge an insane amount to be able to continue the endeavor. But I am always looking for lower tech solutions to problems. (I'm currently looking to replace sand blasting by simply putting the raw bronze in a bucket of gravel in the back of my truck, and letting the natural vibration of moving around remove the investment material from the bronze and knock down sharp edges from flashings.)
Titles aren't of particular importance and may be recycled.
It should also be noted that The Dreamtime series is a new direction of exploration which is not intended to replace my existing established style and aesthetic; but is done in addition to that existing body of work. As different as they may look from my earlier more refined and modern pieces- the base character of my work remains the same: Capturing the animal spirit in times of meaningful transition or action.

-Tim Nimmo