Let me first say I love doing this creative wax work. OK, so call it a lust. I absolutely satisfy my need for a concentrated work environment where I can work in total immersion of what I am making. It also involves a relatively complex selection of tools and processes to complete a project with just the right difficulty that I enjoy.

I wouldn’t have set still long enough as a younger man but at my age and health, it is a wonderful way to spend time. (I had other lusts then.) Each item I make truly contains a part of me through my total effort. It is far different than building a kit or from plans where I am simply duplicating someone else’s design.

In lost wax casting, I am duplicating a process other people have done for hundreds, maybe thousands of years. But the item’s existence will be totally from my effort, even if it is a Celtic Knot that has been a known design for centuries.

At this writing I am not yet great at this work but I am getting more competent. My goal is not to make an item that looks factory made. I want the look and function to be very good but not lose the sense that there is individual human effort in the creation. That will never be an excuse for lack of quality workmanship.

There is so much cheap factory made art; it’s one of my considerations when I decide to make something. I ask myself how will what I make stand apart from a cheap import or other mass production effort. What I’m thinking is, “How do I display the artist effort in the design”?

Perhaps I need to develop a personal style. I don’t know if that can be planned but I hope it develops to a recognizable degree. I think style is always subject to change as my interests do. Style could be something of how I finish or choice of subject. I’ll just let it roll.

I think this standard blog format is a good presentation media. I am not doing the detailed step by step “how-to” documentation here in Dimensional Art Org that I do with my machine shop websites.

I’ll post different stages of a development, if only for my own record and to show some of the effort required making a piece. A finished wax before spruing and casting is an example.

Expensive or complex projects would benefit from production photographs to prove the province of the piece. A series of development photos in a blog can be proof of authenticity.

If I get the urge to explain a project construction in detail, I post a link to one of my “Studio” sites where I will have all the messy details.