Arts in the Park 1999
Special Projects
Dan Spector 

Proposal:  I propose to create three different lifecasts
out of three different casting materials (concrete,
fiberglass, and maybe plaster or other) before the
actual opening of AITP. Each of the three days, at a
preannounced time, I will break one statue out of its
support mold, the actual mold of plaster, gauze and
fiberglass strand in which it was created.
  Alternative 1: Audience members may volunteer to
  help with the process. This entails the use of a
  mallet and wooden chisels. Other than missing the
  chisel and hitting one's own hand, not much can go 
  awry. I will be right next to the volunteer.

  Alternative 2: Nobody but me does any hammering
  and chiselling.  --They insisted on this.   This volunteer-
  chipping was done successfully and enjoyably at
  Eads Gallery some years ago. Tools will
  not be lying around for impromptu bashing.

I hope the feeling of revealing a never-yet-seen work
of art spreads through the crowd. My casting molds have 
a beauty and strength of their own as well.
As a piece is broken out, I will throw away the shards
of the mold and the piece will stay there on view.
  Alternative: I will leave the shards around the exposed piece.
                          --I left the bigger shards to look at.
Costs: Money received from the stipend will go for 
modelling fees, material costs, and shop incidentals. $550!

It is possible that a statue will break while demold-
ing. I would then discuss options with onlookers. I don't
anticipate it, but it is part of the process. 

    My Special Project, Breaking* Out,  is meant to share with you the excitement an artist feels when a new piece is created. Three pieces of lifecast sculpture, one each day, will be 'busted out' of the plaster molds, which were made on the models and then filled with casting materials.  This is especially relevant if you have ever opened a kiln, or developed a photo print: most of the work has been done, but only now can the piece be seen as you conceived it.  Lifecast statues are a sort of 3-D photography: they capture a posed body, and freeze a point in the model's life.  I have found that interacting with people is at least as interesting and valuable as the casting work itself.

   Raised on Long Island, I moved to Memphis in 1974 after graduating from R.I.S.D. to design toys for Wonder Products Co. (rocking horses, toyboxes, wheeled toys) in Collierville. When they moved away, I went to Hunter Fan as packaging and product designer. I started Archicast in 1984 to create architectural castings for renovations and restorations of old buildings.  Having become proficient with plaster, lifecasting looked like a fascinating challenge, after sculpting figurines in clay, and my long involvement in photography. 
My first show was in 1989, and the most recent was last August at Gallery 509.
 
 

This was printed in the festival program.

*They changed my name, "Busting," to "Breaking." Did this classy-up the project?