SculptCAD Rapid Artist — Mark Grote

This post is the fifth in an ongoing series highlighting the artists behind the SculptCAD Rapid Artists Project. (Hit this link for all posts related to the project.)

Mark has been teaching at Loyola University for over thirty years as a full professor and he is a graduate of Washington University St. Louis. Mark has exhibited both nationally and internationally and is the recipient of numerous awards and grants including Fulbright, Pollock Krasner, Joan Mitchell, and Artist and Scholars at the American Academy of Rome.

How did you get involved with the RAPID Artists project?

Nancy Hairston is one of my past students.

Is this your first experience with 3D/digital sculpting technology and tools?

Yes

How have these technologies changed the way you approach your process?

It has opened up many possibilities for producing works or parts of work in mass.

Are these digital tools having an effect on the work you are creating? Are the tools aiding/adding to/hindering the process?

I believe they will have a very positive effect on my future work.

What are your thoughts on the SculptCAD Rapid Artists Project?

It has been a very well organized project and has offered all the artist a lots of information, feed back from other artist. Opened up new possibilities of how one thinks about and how one can make work. I hope they do another one next year and I can participate. Now that I know more I want to use that information.

Looking beyond the project, what do you have coming up in the near future art-wise? Do you have any shows or projects planned?

Project pending at Kohler artist in residence program.

How can people interested in your work get in touch with you?

www.markgrote.com

Here is Mark’s Rapid Artist concept and statement:

Statement The war on the Taliban and Al-Qaeda has now been going on for over nine years. The attackers used box cutters to takeover the four planes. Today we have only one thing we can look at to see our successes. And that is many of the Afghan people have been able to vote. However even that has much to be desired. Scan my finger and construct 234 fingers out of rubber. Dip each in blue ink and attach the box knife.

Head below the fold for more images of Mark’s work.

(All images used by permission and all rights reserved by Grote/Studio)

“Yellow Cake” by Mark Grote

Artist’s description:

Yellowcake came to the world’s attention as the Bush administration’s justification for the invasion of Iraq. The yellowcake referred to was derived from falsified classified documents initially from Niger disclosed by Italian intelligence to the United Kingdom. These documents depict an attempt by the regime of Saddam Hussein in Iraq to purchase yellowcake uranium from Nigeria during the Iraq disarmament crisis. In the end, no Yellowcake existed.

1) Nuclear explosion July 16, 1945.

The centerpiece of the sculpture is a large yellow tank reminiscent of the shape of the first nuclear device exploded at the Alamogordo test site in New Mexico. The title of this test was “Trinity”.

2) Hiroshima August 6, 1945 and Nagasaki Japan August 9. 1945

The Four airplanes landing gears represent the two B-29 bombers “Enola Gay” that dropped the bomb on Hiroshima and “Bock’s Car” that dropped its bomb on Nagasaki. Each is located at the ends of two intersecting aluminum I beams forming an X which references a target point X on a map.

3) Cuban Missile Crisis October15th – 28th 1962

579 hemp ropes is each representational of the ratio of 13/1 nuclear warheads ready for launch respectively in the Soviet Union and in the United States in October 1962. These hemp ropes tipped in a black tar also pictorialise the first use of gunpowder fuses.

4) United States invasion of Iraq March 20, 2003

Yellow Cakes (also called urania) are uranium concentrates obtained from leach solutions, representing an intermediate step in the processing of uranium ores.

"Fooler, Dummy, Pacifier" by Mark Grote

Artist’s description:

The gothic parish church of St. Michael’s, in Honiton England rotates art projects. This installation was inspired by it’s 15th century interior with the surface texture, the baby “pacifiers” defined the years the it has been consecrated ground. The first authentic record of St. Michael’s speaks of it as a small chapel to which a Mr. John Chapman left a donation in 1406.The title reflects the vernacular difference for infant pacifiers in the English language both in the UK and US .

Same device Same language     Same result

The work is constructed of a tire tube, canvas, wax and 595 baby bottle nipples (one for each year the church’s existence when the sculpture was created).