The outer appearance of this pebble was unusual compared to a normal marble pebble. The surface was heavily fissured and it was for this feature that I chose it for this sculpture. Cutting off the bottom of the pebble to form a base proved to be quite difficult because of its unusual hardness.

The composition of the pebble turned out to me a mixture of differing texture marbles bonded by streaks of a grey stone unusual in itself because it created sparks from the carborundum grinding wheel.

Some what appeared to be quartz veins also made working the piece and the final sanding difficult, the quartz streaks are therefore slightly raised above the softer surrounding marble. The fissures in the natural surface of the pebble were formed by the softer marbles eroding faster than the harder material.

Progress Pictures

Original Pebble

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Completed Sculpture [Intermediate]

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Also

August 2009 - Fissured Mushroom Revisited

I was never entirely happy with this piece as originally completed, it continually reminded me of something from Toyland, so I re-worked it, enlarging the recesses to emphasize the ridges, making them parallel.

The final stage was to immerse the whole piece in a bath of dilute hydrochloric acid, the idea being to dissolve the softer surface marble thus emphasizing the quartz veins in relief since they were unaffected by the acid.

The 'shiny' final appearance is not any kind of varnish it's the natural finish after removal from the acid bath.

Completed Sculpture [Final]

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