Jamie's blog

Today was the last day to finish our sculptures.  I cut away the snow with a blunt chainsaw to make the last sections of my nest whilst the other guys made all their finishing touches before the end of the competition at 2pm.  It is always a bit of a rush on the last day, there is often much more work to do than you first realise, especially with ice continuing to form on my eyelashes.   But we all got there, me having to do a little run now and again to warm up my hands which were freezing because of all the slush I was having to make.

Aside from the competition my mission for the day was to get a photo of Santa on his quad bike and to have a go at riding a snow mobile.  Santa minus reindeers is below.  Poor old rudolf has been usurped by 700 horse power, four cillindered quad bike with catapillar tracks.  But then I did not see the bike fly, so maybe Rudolf still has the advantage in the high season.

The snow mobile was incredible.  Mikka took me and Rodrigo on the lake a little faster than the ‘normal’ tourists.  This did not suprise me as we carraded through the snow at ridiculous speeds in the dark, always careful not to get too close to the person in front, just in case you hit them; “Snow mobiles slide you see.  And if you feel yourself going over water, just hit the throttle hard and go over it.”  This was another ‘Oh My God Moment.’  Rodrego and I adorned the correct gear and jumped on our bikes after a few novelty photographs with large smiles and waving arms.  And then down to the serious business of turning on the bike and hitting the throttle.  These things go fast, and I mean seriousely fast, charging accross the lake bouncing over all the bumps on the track and occasionally cutting through the virgin snow to make new tracks, scarring yourself now and again as you feel the mobile bouncing out of control underneath you, but then gaining confidence and letting the people in front go forward so that you can hit the throttle full just for a moment; hold on tight, because if you don’t you won’t have a snow mobile underneath you anymore.

We gathered for our ceremony where Christina and Satu had come to judge. They took us around all the sculptures to make their comments.  For my sculpture ‘The nest’  they were “wordless.”  I am now known as “Wordless Wardley”.  It is a good thing that I have nothing important to say.  Fortunately this did not go against me as I won joint first prise with Rodrego.  This was his first snow sculpture and a great success, well done lad.  Natasha came third with her Snail which I thought was great.  Afterwards we got on Santa’s sleigh to celebrate and he pulled us on his quadbike to his log cabin where we were given presents, I hugged him and all was forgiven for his shortage of presents this year.

So now we are just getting ready to find an ice sauna in the forrest, and afterwards take a taste of the local night life. I will have to recover on the plane if I manage to catch it.  Not the first time believe me.

Cheerio for now

Jamie

Today is New Years day and what a marvel it is to behold.  We saw the new year in by seeing a fire work display that was more like a scene from a war movie with low flying fireworks and the worst fire juggler on earth.

“Now I’m going to…has anyone ever tried to do a hand stand? “  We all cheer, if this is anything like the head stand that he did earlier then it is going to be great.  “Well, for my last act I am going to do a hand stand.”  We are all immediately impressed.  “But when I stand on my hands I am going to spin this stick that is ON FIRE with my feet!”  Oh my God.  Fire Man Sam them proceeds to do a hand stand with his burning stick in his feet, he then begins to actually spin the stick which is incredible considering his flailing head stand trick from earlier that looked like a dying spider on fire.  But he then unfortunately drops it.  “Thank you and good night!” he says with a mighty gusto that just earned him 500 euros.  This boy has some front.

Rodrigo was the first on the court, chipping away at his snow sculpture that is called ‘The Shadow.’  I then ambled out, cheerely listening to some more mellow music to start off the day, whilst cosely wrapped in all my warmest cloths to keep out the cold.  Unfortunately, my big down jacket could not protect my eyes.  I went to take some photos and found that my vision was a little difficult, I put this down to the cold wind but was then corrected by Timo who pointed out that I had ice forming on my eye lashes.  Ice should never form on ones eyelash.  It is silly cold here.

To warm up we plodded along to Misses Clauses hut where she serves the most delicious hot hot soup; moose yesterday and salmon today.  When you have six people sat around a table drinking soup at -20 degrees, the scene ironically resembles a Turkish Sauna with all the steam that is produced.  Santa Claus drops by sometimes on his Quad bike and I was lucky enough to have a chat with him over a full bodied cup of coffee poured from the black kettle from the fire.  It seems that Rudolf and the clan are resting up after a heavy Christmas; reindeer soup tomorrow perhaps.  I challenged Santa Clause on why I only received five presents this year.  It seems he has not been that impressed with my behaviour this year.

After having coffee with the Big Man I then had a quick spin on the husky sleigh which is so great everyone should do it.  Husky dogs are the most amazing creatures, grace and power combined with a pinch of speed thrown into the mix; especially on the down hill.

But then I still had a sculpture to make which is why we are here.  I made the eggs for my nest and all is coming along now, it no longer looks like a swirling mess and has developed some good forms.  I was gluing snow twigs on this late evening with buckets of slush that then freezes and holds  them in place.  Unfortunately, the slush also froze around my gloves, so much so that I could no longer move my hands and sculpt; a sculptor with no hands; how are we supposed to work in these condition?  Again, it is silly cold here and forced me to end my day.

So now to end the day it is Sauna time.  Timo says “Hi.”

Today we woke to see the snow falling and the trees bending in the wind that was coming from over the lake.  Wind in -degree conditions is never a good thing as it means that whatever temperature it is, is going to feel a lot worse on the skin; wind chill factor.

We got outside.  “I don’t know what temperature it is” rants Jukka, “perhaps -14, -25 with the wind chill.”  It was cold, my face felt like it was going to fall of my bones.  I take a bottle of water down, and by the time I went to get a sip the spout had frozen and the water was half ice anyway, rather like my boots.

We carved away through the day.  Simmo and I swiftly cut through our blocks of snow with a simple chain from Natasha; from Russia with love.  Natasha joked earlier in the day that my block of snow was so full of earth and moss that I may as well just make a nest.  Well that’s exactly what I was going to make, a simple nest.  We’ll have to see what it turns out like, as with many sculptures it looks a right mess on the first day, and I didn’t disappoint today!  For dinner we made sausages over a BBQ, I cannot believe we had a BBQ in -14, but there you go, four guys stood around a fire like we had no other place to go.  Some tourists came by looking like they wanted to buy our sausages.  I think after a few moments they understood that they were not welcome and that out precious sausages were not for sale.

One good thing that rolled in today, and I hate to say this, was the arrival of my good friend Timo.  He’ll be carving next to me and bought me a balaclava as a late Christmas present to help preserve my precious Yorkshire skin from the Finnish winter.

Tomorrow is New Years Eve, we will see in 2010, or twenty ten as so many people are now calling it.  What will it bring?  The snow and cold if I am not mistaken.  And perhaps a ride on a husky sled.

Cheerio for now

Jamie

After a hard days work Kimmo said

“Thank you for helping me with my hobby.”

“No problem Kimmo.”  Kimmo made a great contribution whilst sat on his quad bike.

We worked like troopers clearing the lake of snow and then cutting blocks of ice from the lake with a chainsaw and then pulling them out with a quad bike.  There was water all over the place which is why I had to drive the quad bike, my boots were not waterproof.  It is a hard life.

Afterwards, some of us started to compact the snow blocks with the digger and a lot of elbow grease, just in the same way that we compact the sand.  This took us well into the night to finish, and when I offered my light to Rodrego, to that he could see the nails he was hammering, he replied: “I do not need a light to see.”  It seems that the Portuguese have supernatural powers.  Stamina however is not one of them, as Rodrigo is now passed out in his room.

So, we are still in the mental asylum, but have missed the witching hour which was 7:15, as all the clocks seemed to have stopped at that time you see.  We now have safety in numbers as there is 7 of us now.  We will have to see how many of us are here tomorrow.

So I step off the train in darkest Finland, it is -10 and there is Kimmo my long time Polar Bear friend waving his big hand at me.  I go up and great him.  Next to him is standing another guy, and so I go to shake his hand, but then I recognise his face from may years ago, but not from cold climes but from somewhere much hotter.  I shake his hand and am met with a warm smile, one that I have not seen for four years perhaps.  This is one of the wonderful things about my job, you are able to bump into people you have not seen for so long in the most bizarre of places.  It is Rodrigo, from the sunniest Portugal where we used to make sand sculptures together.  He had come all the way to Finland to make ice sculptures for the first time.

We drive into the darkness, the roads covered with snow, Kimmo’s van tyres gripping with ease as he flyes around the corners, the trees bending with the weight of the snow.

“So, we are not staying in a hotel.” pipes Kimmo.

“OK, some log cabins then?” I am not being optimistic, we have stayed in them before.

“Not quite.  Remember when we went to the holiday cottage on the lake?”  Log cabin it is then, this was sounding good, picturesque, boats, saunas fire, BBQ, “…Well, there was a mental hospital that you could see on the hill….”  Oh god.  “We are staying there.”

Since I watched the movie the shining as a child, I have since had a slight phobia of long corridors.  Now long corridors in an old mental asylum are something else.

Through the trees I could see the lights around the buildings as we approached, but no lights in the buildings themselves.  This was a little spookey.  Only one building still had some lights on, and had some patients there; we drove past it and pulled up to another deserted building.

“So, here we are.  You don’t mind if I go home do you Jamie?”  Ah, not at all Kimmo, why have three people go insane when you can get away with two.

“…Oh, and the lights do not work on the stairs.”  What a suprise, an old mental asylum with no lights.  So in we went scrambling in the dark to find our room on the third floor, searching the corridors for number 301.  I looked in one room and there was what appeared to be two beds to each side and then a third table with an operating light hanging low from the ceiling.  I don’t think so.

After a time we found our rooms, and it appears to be a cosy enough appartment.  Still, I opted to share a room rather than have one by myself.

Tomorrow we cut some ice and compact the snow for making the sculptures in the grounds.

Good night.

Jamie

So we rocked on down to Halifax on Sunday and were met by -5 degrees, great conditions for ice carving.  The snow blizzards that came later made things a little tricky, but then added to the Christmas spirit of the event.  Me and James Haigh spent two hours stacking Mary who was to be a whopping 2.5 meters tall and was to stand right in the centre of the Piece Hall.  Ice is very heavy for anyone that has not tried to lift an ice block before.  I was then to spend the rest of the day carving Mary with chainsaw and chisels, and then polish her off with some sanding.

The guys from exquisiteice.co.uk were meanwhile dropping off all the table top sculptures around the town for the trail to commence.  I’d made these sculptures in a freezer in Rotherham the previous week, a special thanks to Matt, Ed and family to helping out and keeping me sane whilst in the freezer.

Cheerio for now, and enjoy the pictures

Jamie

So Frankenstein eventually came to life and had the lights on him, with all the pieces in place for the composition which reflects Michelangelo’s creation; with a few little extras such as the Professor’s tools of pain on the table.

But then before I knew it I was whisked off to the other side of the tent where I had to finish a submarine left by Martijn Rijerse.  He had been a little bit inconsiderate and opted to have a baby before finishing his sculpture, how unprofessional!  However, I have now forgiven him as I saw baby Casper a couple of days ago and he is indeed a diamond.

After finishing the submarine I helped Uldis Zarins from Latvia finnish his Octopus which is wrapping itself around my/Martijn’s submarine.  All in all a great event.

I’m not back in rainy Yorkshire planning for this winters ice sculpture trail in Halifax on the 20^th December.

Cheerio for now

Jamie

The Octopus taking the Submarine

The ice sculpture season has well an truely begun with a truely spanking ice sculpture festival in Holland with icesculpture events.  Two weeks of chainsaws, a load of chiselling and of course ice.

The 35 artists from all over the world did our customary walk through, with the masses of ice awaiting us, kindly stacked up by the Finnish team, what kind soles they are.  After looking at the first ice of the season, all crystal and cold, we were told what are tasks were and to get to it.  I was put with Tim Hanford who is a chap from the UK that has opted to live in the warmer climes of Italy, a great sand and ice carver.

We were together to make the scene of Frankenstein.  Tim was making the big man himself and me the professor with a slight reference to Michelangelo’s ‘Creation’: the professor almost touching the hand of Frankenstein as he brings him to life.  It went pretty well apart from the task of putting on the monsters arms which was really tricky as they are so big and heavy.  But hey, they’re on and there they are!

I’ve put some working photos on and will get an image of the finished piece soon.

Cheerio for now

Jamie

Today is an exceptional day in that it is sunny, the leaves of the proud Beech trees are dashed with all the colours of autumn and the air is unusually warm as it has been dragged all the way from Africa by a weather front says the lady on the telly.  Today, we are breathing African air.  It’s still early: 7:30am.  I was just on the shed roof changing some of the tiles but have refrained from hammering them down yet.  I don’t think the neighbours would appreciate it, especially Becky next door who is three days overdue with her baby.  A baby which incidentally they are going to call Jamie.  Unfortunately, I can’t claim credit, they just like the name.  I will wait until 9am to start the hammering, I wouldn’t want to disturb baby Jamie’s beauty sleep in his mothers belly.

So where are all the sand and ice sculptures?  It is October, my dormant period, and the time when I do wonderful things like tax returns, the ‘dark side’ of my job.  But then it has been a very busy summer.  Travel to Holland, Germany, Finland, Wales, and all over  England.

My pride and joy however, was my sculpture that I made in the town of my birth, Bradford.  A grand sculpture of Charles Darwin and the decent of man.  A little controversial, but the city of Bradford took to it well and there is no other place that I would have rather done it, and right in front of our marvelous Townhall as well.  But then it couldn’t have been done without the ever so talented Nicola Wood, and the infatiguable support of James Haigh, Sparrow the God and Kymm Edwards; the champions of sand sculpture; and I cannot forget to mention Uriah Woodhead who gave us all the materials for the project.

Click on the link to view a film by aberration films of the Continue reading “Leaves falling from the trees” »