Creative metal coating | Natalie Guy

Creative metal coating by Metalier – Zen reading on the Rocks

Creative metal by Metalier has been used on a number of occasions by Auckland artist, Natalie Guy.  She used Metalier’s Flexible Brass on a lamp-fitting shown by the Wallace Collection at Pah Homestead.  She has also used it on a wide variety of substrates including bamboo, polystyrene and wood.

Because Metalier is “metal as art”, we were pleased to be able to support Natalie’s creative metal work when she was chosen as an artist for the recent sculpture trail at Waiheke Island in the Hauraki Gulf, Auckland, New Zealand.  It is an honour to be chosen to exhibit at Sculpture on the Gulf.  34 artists were chosen from over 250 initial proposals.  Natalie also sold the work so that’s fantastic too.

Reading Zen in the Rocks – About the work

Natalie entitled the work Reading Zen in the Rocks.  It merges the myth of the Zen Garden and mid-century modernism.  The work references the modernist sculptor Isamu Noguchi and combines two of his works.  One is the 1962 Lessons of Musokokushi a bronze garden of flat-bottomed rocks.  The second is the iconic Akari paper lampshades which has been replicated widely and is available very cheaply.

The rocks in Reading Zen in the Rocks have been inverted – the flat bottom skyward and the top nestling into the earth.  The rocks appear to be solid bronze, but only the top element, the replica Akari are.  Their shaping alludes to the concentric circles around rocks placed in a traditional raked sand garden.  The lower element is created using a lightweight concrete/plastered hollow mould coated with Metalier Smoky Bronze. The materials are inverted with the lower part lightweight and humble with a creative metal coating and the top is weighty and expensive.  The flattening of the Akari form which negates its practical role and adopts new possibilities would seem, the artist says, to be counter-intuitive to modernists principles.  Natalie concludes that her work might, however, invite a fresh consideration of modernism’s natural lineage.

The setting for the sculpture trail is beautiful Waiheke Island – along a magical headland – in the sun, after a walk of an hour or two round the headland you can relax with a beautiful glass of Waiheke wine.  What’s not to like?

Metalier is science, practice and creativity

Metalier coatings are a mixture of science, practice and creativity.  You have to “feel” it as well as know practically what to do and of course without the Metalier science you don’t have a coating at all.  The most creative Metalier applicators are those who have “got” the feeling and can let their art run wild.  That’s one of the reasons we so like working with artists.

To find out how you can get the “feeling” or to ask questions about other things you can email us or telephone us (Mary on 021 732746 or 09376 7099).