GÜMÜSLÜK

Sculpture with the
'Iron Man'
By Emre Basaran

Our first move was to find some iron. The first step to create an iron sculpture was to gather 'I' profiles and box shaped pieces of iron. Alan decided what we needed and how many of iron profiles we needed. I did know how made up his mind. He told me that he did not do sketches...
The second step was to bend the iron. We had to make our way to the local blacksmiths for that.

When power was excerted vertically to the iron, the material was either getting smashed or tearing apart. Even though the blacksmiths were annoyed with this, Alan seemed were confident of himself. He told the blacksmith's to imagine that the god was very furious and he got all his anger from this piece of metal. This remarked seemed to have relaxed the blacksmiths and they kept on smiling until the work was completed. Sometimes they were telling each other that they turned the iron pieces into scrapmetal, but it was obvious that they enjoyed a worry-free day at work. We all enjoyed forging the two 'I' shaped iron pieces.
Soon after we moved the material into the sculpture workshop and settled our tools, Alan got into a thoughful mood and remained like that for sometime. Next he stood up and said 'I am going to tell you what we will do. We only need one thing for a star, an idea.' Then he continued 'The only idea we have right now is this: the Academy might be the future'.

We started working. We did not do anything the whole day, but cutting iron profiles and trying them in one composition or in other.

After a long while, we have decided about the composition we wanted. Now it was time to do some soldering and we had a problem. There was either a problem with our torch or with the power supply of the Academy. None of our soldering was coming out how we wanted. We had a go countless times, we changed the circuits, but Alan was still not satisfied with the result.

Finally, we decided to move as close as possible to the main power supply and located ourselves to the small road between the open-air kitchen and we are aiming to speed up the work, but the state of our torch had prevented that. As far as I could see, Alan was patiently trying over over again, he was not satisfifed with the outcome. He was showing me the soldering he did and telling me 'Look, these are empty inside. We cannot trust them'. He looked without hope.

The President of the Gumusluk Academy Trust, made a couple of successful phone calls. The Blacksmiths, with whom we worked, had agreed to rent us a proper torch.

We only managed to arrange the pick up our new torch late afternoon. This was not easy for Alan since he hated to sit around when he could work instead. Still, when we finally got hold of our new mashine he gained his cheerfull spirit back. The Academy was successful in porviding the Artist with the tools he wanted and we ended the day in a happy mood.

Soldering was at last over. The sculpture gained its final form. Now we had to clean the profiles. A hard task, requiring both power and patience...

When Alan was convinced that the surface of the sculpture was completely cleaned, we started anti-rusting ?? Alan, who had years of experience in iron sculpting, regarded this stage particularly important. Well, actually, there was no stage that was not particularly important for Alan. We painted all the sides of the profiles: inside- outside, upside-downside. We could not have created 'something that would rust within two years'.

Sculpture with the 'Iron Man'

Our first move was to find some iron. The first step to create an iron suclpture was to gather 'I' profiles and box shaped pieces of iron. Alan decided what we needed and how many of iron profiles we needed. I did know how made up his mind. He told me that he did not do sketches...

The second step was to bend the iron. We had to make our way to the local blacksmiths for that.

When power was excerted vertically to the iron, the material was either getting smashed or tearing apart. Even though the blacksmiths were annoyed with this, Alan seemed were confident of himself. He told the blacksmith's to imagine that the god was very furious and he got all his anger from this piece of metal. This remarked seemed to have relaxed the blacksmiths and they kept on smiling until the work was completed. Sometimes they were telling each other that they turned the iron pieces into scrapmetal, but it was obvious that they enjoyed a worry-free day at work. We all enjoyed forging the two 'I' shaped iron pieces.

Soon after we moved the material into the sculpture workshop and settled our tools, Alan got into a thoughful mood and remained like that for sometime. Next he stood up and said 'I am going to tell you what we will do. We only need one thing for a star, an idea.' Then he continued 'The only idea we have right now is this: the Academy might be the future'.

We started working. We did not do anything the whole day, but cutting iron profiles and trying them in one composition or in other.

After a long while, we have decided about the composition we wanted. Now it was time to do some soldering and we had a problem. There was either a problem with our torch or with the power supply of the Academy. None of our soldering was coming out how we wanted. We had a go countless times, we changed the circuits, but Alan was still not satisfied with the result.

Finally, we decided to move as close as possible to the main power supply and located ourselves to the small road between the open-air kitchen and the recreation hall. This meant that we were going to work in the open air.

We are aiming to speed up the work, but the state of our torch had prevented that. As far as I could see, Alan was patiently trying over over again, he was not satisfifed with the outcome. He was showing me the soldering he did and telling me 'Look, these are empty inside. We cannot trust them'. He looked without hope.

The President of the Gumusluk Academy Trust, made a couple of successful phone calls. The Blacksmiths, with whom we worked, had agreed to rent us a proper torch.

We only managed to arrange the pick up our new torch late afternoon. This was not easy for Alan since he hated to sit around when he could work instead. Still, when we finally got hold of our new mashine he gained his cheerfull spirit back. The Academy was successful in porviding the Artist with the tools he wanted and we ended the day in a happy mood.

When his problems were solved, Alan gained speed. The scuplture, which remained the same for days, was rapidly transforming. First we finished the bottom part and then the contruction on the very top. Finally, when we brough together the pieces that were shaped at the blacksmith's the rough sculpture was completed. Alan was smiling.

Soldering was at last over. The sculpture gained its final form. Now we had to clean the profiles. A hard task, requiring both power and patience...

When Alan was convinced that the surface of the sculpture was completely cleaned, we started anti-rusting ? Alan, who had years of experience in iron sculpting, regarded this stage particularly important. Well, actually, there was no stage that was not particularly important for Alan. We painted all the sides of the profiles: inside- outside, upside-downside. We could not have created 'something that would rust within two years'.

While the sculpture team completed the anti-rusting, the logistics team completed the base of the scuplture at a previously decided location. Next, we had the complete probably the most difficult stage: carrying the sculpture.

Accroding to a 'witness statement' we undertook this task in the 'Turkish way'. We did the impossible and put our huge iron sculpture on its base. Everything was going was planned.

The painting stage required as much as detailed work as did the anti-rusting. The pained the whole sculpture paying attention to even the smallest of details.

'Colours' said Alan 'are very important. If we used yellow instead of red here, everyting would've been completely different'.
Finally, the painting stage came to an end. The sculpture was completed. For those who want to analyise, criticise, realise please be our guest at the Academy.

Alan valued getting the job done in the best possible way, more than being admired for it. So, how did the sculpture turn out : In the words of Alan Valtat, 'welldone'.