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‘Song of the Bell’!"

Bell Founding and Performance Metal Casting!"

Winston Churchill Travel Fellowship 2014!"

David Snoo Wilson! "

"" "Page 1 ! ! Table of contents"Page 2 ! ! Introduction and purpose of my Winston Churchill travel fellowship "Page 3 ! ! Itinerary"Page 4-6 ! ! Introduction to bell founding!Page 7-10 ! ! Case Study - The Grassmayr Bell Foundry!Page 11 ! ! Case Study - Maria Laach"Page 12-13 ! ! Case Study - ‘Research Song of the bell’ Frierich Schillier!Page 14 ! ! The Iron Pour Community"Page 15 - 16! ! Case Study - Iron pouring at Jāņi"Page 17! ! Case Study - playing with iron for the first time!Page 18 - 19 ! ! Case Study - Aizpute Iron Casting Symposium!Page 20 - 21! ! Conclusion""""

� of �2 21Introduction!"I am a bronze founder who is interested in the display of metal casting as a powerful medium for an audience. For the last four years I have made a public performance and ritual of bell casting, playing on the old histories and myths of the itinerant founder from the medieval period as a form of storytelling. ""For 7 years I ran the metal shop and foundry at City and Guilds Art School in London. It was here that I first experienced the wonder of playing the alchemist. Displaying the transmutation of solid metal to liquid, the process would climax in an original sculpture. Students would have an immediate visceral emotional response. This, in turn, galvanised me into showing more people the process and I started making public performances of bell casting. ""

"Vivos voco. Mortuos plango. Fulgura frango”," "I call the living, I mourn the dead, I repel lightning."[2]""

Why make a bell? To make such a public performance the audience needs to be watching emotionally invested in the object (either that or it’s got be one hell of a show!) by making a bell for a space or community you mark that time and give power and weight. Bells as objects have history through their varying uses, whether it be at the town hall or at closing time in a bar. Chain ringers across the land make use of church bells, with a congregation willing to travel hundreds and sometimes thousands of miles to see the creation of the bell. Bells are objects both of the church and a secular community.""The purpose of my Winston Churchill travel fellowship is to !-enrich my knowledge of performance metal casting, "-look at the bell foundries of central Europe to gain a deeper cultural understanding"-and finally to research the Friedrich Schiller text “the song of the bell’ ""This body of research has constituted the starting point for development of a performance 'the Song Of The Bell.’ Working with artist Jo Lathwood and writer Nick Hunt. The fellowship has enabled me to help produce this performance, straddling the boundaries of live metal casting and story-telling. By using this format we reach a wide audience and create an awareness of the practical, theatrical and social meaning of this ancient craft."1

Picture, Left to right, Nick Hunt, Jo Lathwood and David Snoo Wilson1

� of �3 21Itinerary !"Poland"10th June, Poland, Kruszewskich foundry, ""Latvia"14th-18th June, Riga, Digital pattern making. Part of Iron pour convention. "19th-23rd June, Pedvale Sculpture park, 7th International Iron Pour Convention."26th July- 7th July, Serde Iron pour Symposium.""Germany"10th july, Weimar, the research centre for european classicism."11th July, Apolda, Apolda Bell Museum"14th July, Leipzig, Meeting, Lissi Unger, Schiller academic. "15th July, Lauchhammer, Lauchhammer foundry. ""Austria ""18th July, Innsbruck, Grassmayr Bell foundry""Germany""21st July, Sinn, Rinker Bell Foundry"23rd July, Otterbach, Ars Fundendi"25th July, Maria Laach Abbey, Maria Laach Bell Foundry""UK""1st-7th August, Bristol, song of the Prep, "8th August, Oxfordshire, performance ‘song of the Bell’""""""""""""""2"""""""""" Image, ‘Song Of The Bell’ Performance Wilderness 20142

� of �4 21Bell founding!"Intro!"During my fellowship I went to five different bell foundries, all with very different views and cultures. I learnt much from each of them and came to understand some of the lore and traditions of bell founding from central Europe. I will give an overview of some of my findings and two case studies at the end of this segment. "

"3"There is an incredibly rich history in these foundries which has been established over centuries and effect by Europe’s waxing and waning economies; wars that swept across the mainland destroying knowledge and transmuting bells into arms. Frequently Bell foundries will have the tag line, ‘the country’s oldest manufacturing business’ or ‘oldest run family business’ etc etc. The foundry's histories are part of the country’s history, and reflect what is happening economically, politically, industrially and religiously.""The casting of bells is an increasingly hard market to prosper in, with less churches in Europe being built. There is also a greater emphasis on conservation of old bells as opposed to melting them down to make new ones. Also the price of copper, the main metal in bells, over the last 25 years has gone up by 1000% (not including rate of inflation). With greater secularisation and less money there is less demand.""In the British Isles there are two bell foundries using the loam technique remaining, namely John Taylor of Loughborough and Whitechapel of London and across Europe there are not many of the old loam foundries left. Johannes Grassmayr of the 400 year old Grassmayr foundry said that 20 years ago there were 80 bell foundries but in another 20 years there will only be 5. Before leaving

Image, Maria Laach Bell Foundry Germany. Bell Molds being Prepared 3

� of �5 21on my fellowship I got in contact with, Petit & Fritsen in the Netherlands only to get an email back saying that they were to due to close in the following month because of merging with Royal Eijsbouts bell foundry. ""Royal Eijsbouts are probably the market leader with huge tonnage output and famously and controversially in the UK they cast the Olympic bell. Royal Eijsbouts are also market leaders in bell casting technologies, having heavily invested in technological advancement after the war. However they don’t use the traditional loam investment material, instead they use a form of sand casting. They have purportedly created computer programs that have alleviated the need for humans in both the profile making stage and the tuning stage. Which, as one bell founder who will remain nameless said ‘creates a bell which is like purified water, pure but dead inside’. ""The use of loam for bell molds is ideally suited to the making of bells, having the advantages over sand and investment casting due to expansion rates and gas release. But this is also incredibly time consuming and an expensive process to do. Some of the mixes for the loam layers need to sit for months at a time to get the right consistency. All the foundries I visited had their own recipes for loam and had some aspect of the molding process that was not straight up loam. Mostly the use of other techniques was restricted to fine detail work. ""Peter Glassbrenner, of Ars Fudendi, was trained as an apprentice using loam techniques but being a two person operation he said how it wasn’t suitable for his bell making. A lot of the work his workshop did was for a Bavarian bell welding company. Making up segments of bells where parts were missing or producing the welding rod for the company, with a visceral understanding of the metallurgy. ""A consequence of World War II for bells was that the Third Reich confiscated 82.5% of bells in Germany a total of 102,500. The sum total of bells taken by all fascist governments between 1939-1945 was 170,195. For German bell foundries this meant that there was a large market after the war with many churches wanting to replace their missing bells. It also meant that other occupied countries also lacked bells. It seems that in the last 20-30 years this deficit in bells has been accommodated for, consequently many foundries have shut. ""For bell foundries the iron curtain also caused a great divide with the enforced secularisation by the governments bell foundries, under communism, this luxury for churches were not tolerated. One of the exceptions to the rule was the Kruszewski Bell Foundry in Poland. The family foundry had been operational since 1846. After the war they operated secretly firing up at night to evade the government until 1966. In the 1000 year anniversary of Poland the government let churches celebrate, by letting the foundry operate legitimately and obtaining new bells.""Since the fall of the Iron curtain there are bell foundries popping up in Hungary and Russia, The latter being headed by a former nuclear physicist. " " " " " "4

Image Bells Damages and otherwise, Apolda Bell Museum Germany4

� of �6 21Many of the bell foundries I visited offered services to do onsite casting at churches or other spots. Rinker bell foundry cast an 8.3 tonnes bell in situ at Halberstadt. A lot of people involved in the industry believe in the romanticism of the itinerant founder from yesteryear and tap into and stored that spirit. Hanns Rinker talked of how he wanted to melt down the bronze with wood furnaces for the 8.3 tonnes bell but the local council stopped him on account of the pollution. In the end due to complicated by-laws that had to melt the bronze in a local cast iron factory. This involved relining the iron cupola furnace and then pouring the molten bronze into a truck capable of moving molten liquids. Then having an incredibly nervous drive across town. The work of doing casting on site is considerable, there are more variables and more things that can go wrong, but you tap into the spirit of the old itinerant founders having to overcome problems and making a show of the foundry.""The old cliche of bell founders being secretive folk rang both true and not true. Some were cagey about knowledge and weren’t giving anything away, while others were incredible forthcoming. There didn’t really seem to be a consistent strand of secrecy with one foundry hiding one aspect of production, while others were hiding another. In a way I felt happy that the stereotype was true but confused at the lacking of consistant strands between the foundries. While one foundry was very happy to divulge all of the makings of their loam- making materials but they did not want any documentation of their bell profiles. Another foundry was very secretive about their loam technique but very informative about other very specialised knowledge. ""The world of bell founding is a small one, all the founders and experts that I met knew each other. Some I met had complicated shared histories together, in the case of Hanns Rinker and Joannesse Grassmayr they had known each other since being boys, both coming from of their family foundries with the extraordinary age over 400 years. A lot of the foundries have straight up competition with each other but while they are business rivals there is a sense of kinship and camaraderie. "

"5Although the bell casting market is tricky one, in the last fifteen years a new loam foundry has been set up at Maria Laach Abbey fronted by Brother Michael, where they have a decent and respectable output and a workforce of four. Brother Michael, who heads the foundry wasn’t worried about bell foundries closing and said that there was enough work for all, but they needed to share it between all the foundries. Brother Michael managed to reinforce and destroy many cliches of bell founding at the same time. I was expecting him to be the most esoteric of the founders I met but in the event he turned out to be the most grounded and matter of fact. While talking to the congregation about the bell making process and how a certain process was done, at this he looked whimsically into the air and stated ‘ALCHEMY’ a second latter he broke the magic and stated ‘science.’ ""

He also shared in the fears of the actual process of casting bell. After a bell pouring one of the congregation asked him how he thought it had gone. He retorted that since he was a child he always expected things like exams to go badly. But generally they went well. Just as I was leaving he shared the ‘English’ saying that I’ve never heard before ‘surprised as a bell founder.’"""" Image: Hanns Rinker and David Snoo Wilson at 5

� of �7 21Case study Grassmayr Bell Foundry!"In Innsbruck, Austria lives the bell foundry Grassmayr, this family business have been making bells since 1599. Grassmayr are at the forefront of modern bell technology ‘experimenting at least once a month’ with different parts of the process, but they are very rooted in history and traditions of the old bell foundries of Europe. They are also Austria’s oldest running artisanal family business.""On the day I visited the foundry, they were to cast 20 tonnes in bronze bells, the largest amount of bronze that the foundry had ever poured in a day, many bell foundries will cast 20 tonnes in a year. They also cast a 8,300kg bell which was the fifth largest bell in the foundry’s history. The 8,300kg bell was being cast for a church in Skopje in Macedonia along with two other at 5,300kg and 2,300kg. "

"6"Through out the day it was amazing to see three generations of the Grassmayrs working seamlessly within the roles of the foundry family. The patriarch and grandfather Christof Grassmayr shepherded the audience and congregation around the foundry. The matriarch was there to welcome the clients and after the bell casting to distribute special casting schnapps in the foundry garden. The sons of Christof, Johannes and Peter, Johannes dealt with the business side while Peter was the head founder. Johannes was my point of contact and was incredibly welcoming showing me around the foundry with much diligence, considering around a couple of hundred people had gathered from various congregations, as well as extended family from overseas and "

Image: Grassmayr Bell Foundry, Austria. Founder is inserting a Alma tree as a deoxidant to the 6

molten bell metal.

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other persons of special interest, Johannes took time and care to see everyone, even me. Peter the other brother was a little more stern looking, as a founder should be. He had the brow of a man who had been up all night with 8.3 tonnes of bronze. There was also a plethora of grandchildren running around handing out a sweet hard cake with the casting schnapps, their faces undeniably had the face of the family line. ""Johannes said in the morning ‘that all the children as they reached their tenth birthday where allowed to help pour a bell.’ In the afternoon one of the grandchildren did indeed help pour a bell. This form of engagement is clearly necessary to stimulating the next generations involvement within the family trade. ""The patriarch, Christoff, said with great glee that all of his male grandchildren wanted to work at the foundry, which made me wonder, if in years to come would there be a great

split in this harmoniously working family. In a lot of the family histories of bell foundries there is usually a problem of accession and which brother gets to take over the family firm. Sometimes two brothers will end up working against each other. In Poland, at the moment, three of the four bell foundries are run by three brothers who split the father’s foundry and all went at it alone. Looking at the Grassmayr family and foundry I’m guessing that the line will carry on and the business will go from strength to strength. Johannes said that 20 years ago there were 80 bell foundries in Europe today perhaps 40 and he predicts that in another 20 years that there will only be 5. I’m perhaps not that skeptical but do see as prices for the raw materials go up and the greater secularisation of Europe and beyond there is less money for bells. ""The actual cycle of the pour was quite a spectacle, a merging of industry and religion. The workers were all dressed in foundry gear which has a hint of a post apocalyptic priest. When it nears pour time the burners are turned off then they open up the furnace and the remaining tin is thrown in. At this point they get what is essentially a small branchless Alda tree and mix the molten bronze in the furnace with it. This acts as a degassifier for the metal but theatrically looks like a scene from Dante's Inferno, with a man energetically moving a tree trunk around the furnace and flames billowing out. At this point a priest from the Macedonian church said a prayer for the bell and its successful completion, all of the foundry hands took off their helmets as a sign of respect. Then he made a blessing with holy water firstly to the mold of the bell and then the head founder Peter Grassmayr. After which Peter said ‘ “In Gottes Namen” in the name of god. To see 8.3 tonnes of bell being poured is quite a sight, to, especially when it has such biblical size and connotations. It is something I will hold onto for quite some time.""" Image: Grassmayr, Austria pouring 8300kg Bell7

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"""8

After the afternoon pour Joanesse invited me and my translator into the back room to have a beer with all the foundry hands. The had a post pour dazed look of having sweated their body weight out and done a good days work. This is an ancient family firm which has survived the course of the centuries, but it is reliant on the many hands that keep it together""""

Image, Back room of the Grassmayr Foundry, Austria, Mido Oldenburg and Peter Grassmayr On 8

left

� of �10 21New and old traditions !"The Grassmayr foundry have very consciously taken on symbols for their bells in modern times. I was very taken by the use of sage leaves in a modern context . I had seen sage leaves on German bells from 1100-1500 but nothing from the last 500 years. So I was very interested in quizzing members of the family about its usage. In the best of oral traditions I got two very different answers. One was it was like a having coffee which awoke the soul, the other was about its more traditional healing qualities. "9"On the cannon of all the Grassmayr bells lives angel heads which are said to bless the bells. This is is not a common feature on Anglican bells and was far been more typical of Roman Catholic bells but has been a feature on their bells for centuries. Secondly is the use a salamander and griffin. The griffin is historical for the Grassmayr foundry, but the salamander is a modern appropriation. This is not too discredit it, salamanders are frequently used icons based around foundry work: and even 400 year old foundries need to start new traditions. """""""""""""""""""""""!10

Image: Grassmayr bell with details of angels on crown and salamanders 9

Image: Grassmayr Plaque celebrating 400 years of the foundry with sage leaf and traditional 10

signet of griffin

� of �11 21Case Study!"Maria laach!"Maria Laach is a Benedictine abbey in Rhineland, which dates backs to 1093. Since 1999 they have been casting bells with brother Michael. Brother Michael is purportedly the only bell casting monk in the world. He had originally trained to be a bell specialist and expert but found that this was not enough for him and started to cast bells in July 1999. ""His initial experiments were with an old iron furnace from a recently shut down factory. They had melted down 25kgs and then made a bell “and then to our shock it came out ok” after this joyous experience he then started to experiment over the coming year. After a period the finance department called them to their office and said either he had to find customers for his bells or he would have to stop his expensive experiments. His brother said that he’d stop, but today the foundry is alive and well it is employing four people full time. "There is a curious scientific manner within Brother Michael's practice: I was expecting naively that he’d be the most spiritual/esoteric/secretive of the founders I met which couldn’t be further from the truth, he was frank, pragmatic and sharing in his knowledge as a founder."" When I asked what it meant to him, casting bells in an abbey meant to him, , I was prepared for a talk about how ancients monks and priest would walk across the landscape with forged bells. Instead I got an astute answer: how he didn’t see this as his holy calling but rather more pragmatically as something that he wanted to at the abbey. Bell casting is something that belongs to an abbey but not wholley exclusively. There is no record of bells being cast at the abbey, and brother Michiel didn’t see it as apart of a holy tradition but as something pragmatically that he wanted to do in a abbey. At the abbey the loam technique that they use was the most orthodox that I saw during my fellowship." """""""""""""""""""""""""11" Image Maria Laach: Bell pouring 11

� of �12 21Research Song of the bell!"‘Song of the bell’ is a poem written in the 1790’s by Friedrich Schiller. In its most basic form it draws the parallels between a man’s life and the creations of a bell, with an ending which suggest that chaos will ensue if you strike against the political status quo. ""I’m interested in this text to use the foundry aspect as a part of a bell-casting performance in the UK. The poem recounts, in wonderful verse, the creation of a bell from start to finish. Describing the production of a bell is a challenging process; one must visualise many forms going from positive to negative to liquid metal. The bell founding description part of the Friedrich schiller poem is achieved very well and it is written in such a way that even if you can’t visualise the process you can engage with its poetry. But I am quite aware that there are other parts of the poem that are politically dated or out of kilter with my own politics. So before naively jumping to conclusions in an adaptation one needs to be well aware of the context.""Travels!"My research took me to Leipzig and Weimar. In Weimar I went to the Klassik Stiftung Weimar and was assisted around their libraries. There is a huge amount of background information and research on Schiller and Goethe, their English equivalents would be perhaps Dickens or Shakespeare in terms of the sheer volume of research surrounding their work. In the libraries I was able to see the only hand-written copy that exists from the age of Schiller which is stored in the library’s archives. I haven't ever had the actual experience of handling an original text before and it did cause me quite a thrill. I understood little of it because it was written in old German using pre Roman alphabet, Gothic script. And understanding no German, old or new, but I certainly did understood the excitement of actually looking at an authentic text. "

"12"In Leipzig I had the good fortune to have met up with Lissi Unger, a postgraduate student at the University of Leipzig. She has specialised in Friedrich Schiller and her MA thesis is called ""‘Kontinuität und Wandel des Freiheitsideals Friedrich Schillers" am Beispiel des Liedes von der Glocke’ "or" ‘Continuity and change of the ideal of freedom Friedrich Schiller "on the example of ‘The Song of the bell’""""""

Klassik Stiftung Library Weimar12

� of �13 21Learnings of the text!"The text was very well received by the public but wasn’t without its critics when the poem was published in 1798. At that point it had been gestating for almost ten years. Schiller fans and critics had been wondering what had happened to his output. It was received by some who were enthralled by this romanticised look at the crafts and parallels with a man’s life. Others were appalled by its overly simplistic logic of the working man, and its crass politics of maintaining the status quo. "It also had many satirical versions - over 250 to date. Schiller’s contemporaries considered the text a black and white account and somewhat politically narrow. Many historians consider him as a revolutionary character in terms of the enlightenment and rationalism, but his politics which can be read through this poem is very much about maintaining the current political system and in that the rigidity of the class system. Schiller was not a gentleman by "birth but the son of a military doctor and non-aristocratic wife. Ennobled later in life in 1802 by his patron the Duke of Weimar. Schiller’s life is a complex “rags to riches” story, from a talented but quite penniless thinker and writer who takes a rocky road to becoming more formally and financially established. which in turn DOES explain why later in life he tones down his earlier youthful idealism into something more protective of the status quo. After all he’s got a family, has much experience of disease, being at the whim of patrons and the ensuing financial instability, but he has now reached a stable plateau. So, unsurprisingly, he felt justified in maintaining his position within this layered society.""The last segment of the poem highlights what happens to society when it goes towards a revolution. This is believed to be a commentary on what was going on in France at the time. This was also, at face value, contrary to Schiller’s previous works like ‘The Robbers.’ In this play Schiller had been considered something of a literary rebel; with ‘The Song of the Bell’ he became part of the establishment. ""Over the years people have kept talking about ‘Song of the Bell.’ it remained divisive and controversial and it still had the power to spark national debate in 1967. Up until the 1950’s it was necessary for all school children to know it off by heart. In Germany today it holds little place in the German national consciousness and is largely consigned to specialist fields. After the nineteenth century unification of Germany the text was used to try and build a national consciousness for Germany itself. In a certain light you might consider it the German version of Blake's ‘Jerusalem’ in that it evokes a sense of nationalist political strife and it harks back to an older and more scared sacred time. So it could be used for many political ends. ""Now the poem is known by some people but is recognised as little tired. I have no doubt that it shall rear its head in the centuries to come and become relevant again before being put into the bed of history shortly after. ""Foundry Contact!"Unfortunately for researchers, Schiller burnt all his notes after finishing his text, so original source material is limited. However, the Klassik Stiftung Weimar library has correspondence between Goethe and Schiller, in which Schiller wrote of reading the 1788 Oeconomische Encyclopädie and using it as reference point for bell casting. The copy which Schiller used was suspected to be lost in the fire at the library Klassik Stiftung Weimar of 2004. However there are other surviving copies in other German libraries and also digitised versions. ""There is also anecdotal evidence about Schiller visiting a bell foundry in Ludwigsburg and sitting awkwardly at the back of the room as the founder was annoyed with this gentleman getting in his way. The bell foundry family described several generations later -""how Schiller repeatedly visited the casting works and interrogated the casting master, who was at first not pleased about this disruption to the work, and how the pale scholar considerately took a seat at the wall in a high-backed chair in order not to disturb the work." "

� of �14 21The Iron pour community""I’m interested in the iron pour community, is to learn from their metal casting events and performances. Iron pouring is a spectacular process in itself. However some artists have gone a step further and harnessed the iron pouring act into performances. This brought me to Latvia for The Seventh International Iron Pour Convention.""“I intend to engage a broader conversation regarding the inherent ritualistic nature of iron casting. In addition to making objects, I engage with “process” as a means to communicate within a performative context, thus connecting the resulting “object” to the act of making it. In an effort to bring an object’s inception to light, the act or ritual functions to imbue the artwork with a sense of time, effectively downgrading the manufacture of the iron object as the sole purpose for the act. The act, as we may recognize, is part of a confirmation of knowledge upon others, essentially generating a new communitas born of ritual.”""Matthew Toole""Artist USA""The community mostly originates from some American artists, in the 60’s. These artists started a DIY iron-casting movement that has grown and expanded over time. The movement learned how to make their own cupola (Iron melting furnaces) and to recycle old cast iron objects, to turn it into large scale casted metal art. One of the massive benefits of using cast iron is that it is a cheap material and the cost of making a large cast sculpture is not in money but time and labour. This created communities of people that still work together towards the creation of art mostly outside the financial sphere. ""This turned into a burgeoning artistic scene with many metal sculpture coming together, and making molds to create large art works. This still happens at many sites in the US and is mostly based around art schools but extends beyond it as well. So there are small communities elsewhere in the world namely, UK, Latvia, France, Finland and others. But it is massively dominated by the American artists.""""""""""""""""

� of �15 21Case Study!"Jāņi!"The Seventh International Iron Pour Convention happened in Europe this year in Latvia. I attended the conference at Pedvale sculpture park and then went on to Serde Iron Pour Symposium. The Seventh International Iron Pour Convention was also held on the night of Jāņi. On this night there was a huge amount of iron pour performances combined with Jāņi (Jani is latvian midsummers celebration) traditions combining rituals with casting Iron. ""The first performance started at sundown, which just so happened to coincide with a thunder storm. In the performance there was a lot imagery which is used in Anglo pagan traditions, but used in a slightly different manner, the throwing salt into a fire as well as taming of dark demons by light demons. At the crescendo is an offerings to the gods of buckets of freshly made, cheese, beer and bread which are sacrificed by pouring molten iron them which has varying wonderful effects. This is all administered by a cupola strapped to the back of a trailer which will then go deliver iron to the next performance. The work was engineered by the delightful Stephen Coles, a Brit from Dorset. ""There were a lot of performances that didn’t go ahead due to the freezing up of cupolas. This is a problem of live technical art where most of the persons involved are using other peoples equipment. There were also some rather crude offerings on the table as well which I would have expected better of artist most of which had flown across the atlantic to get there. ""My favourite performance of the evening was also the final one, George Beasley's basket furnace. George Beasley, has in the past, made use of a furnaces out of organic materials namely a log. The furnace was made of willow and elevated around two meters in the air. It silhouette was carved perfectly upon the horizon with the coming day. "13

Image: George Beasley basket furnace

� of �16 21Lessons and thoughts!"The Iron Pour convention had taught me a lot in regard to performance and how to orchestrate the spectacular, but I’m also pleased in a reaffirmation of my own knowledge. I was expecting to have wider differences of understanding of these two spheres between bronze and iron but most of the time people were intrigued and welcoming. I gained insights into pouring metal and making a show of it. Seeing so many different styles and techniques of metal casting performance enlightened me to what works well and the necessity of having your equipment in fine tuning. """Iron Conclusions of the practise!"Iron casting is a wonderful spectacle for the unknowing eye, to those new to the process of iron casting it can be a performance, as it is so spectacular. In the context of the artist led iron movement it brings the artist hand to hand with every stage of the making process, from the beginning of mold making to the pouring of the metal. More and more artists are being separated from the craft and industry that frequently makes the work of art. Health and safety and insurance papers have restricted art schools, institutions and people engaging with the more dangerous sides of creation. This has left people with softer hands, and less engagement with materials.""it is also about being part of the pour itself the drama and integration of making objects with the promethean flame stolen from industry. It can feel a bit like an extreme sport at times exhilarating, at others exhausting and something I can highly recommend. I have learned much in how to harness the drama and power of live metal casting with the iron pour community, lessons that I will bring to bear for my own works. ""The iron pour community has been going for near 50 years now and there some wonderful auteurs within it. The difference between iron and bronze pouring to the unknowing eye or mind is but semantics. However there is a huge fundamental difference, iron furnaces are bigger and necessitates a larger crew, it is much more inherently dangerous but it is significantly cheaper to make BIG art. All of these things contribute to camaraderie and the community of the crowd and have made it a scene. An American described the difference between iron and bronze pouring as being a bit like cooking on a camp fire or cooking on a stove. I think is an apt analogy.""“Object making is an essential component to the foundry sculptor where the ritual lies in the act, either consciously or subconsciously. Simply stated, that by following a prescribed order or method, one engages with ritual. In this regard, the rite is interconnected with the material as it is to those that work with it.""In these performances, I attempt to bring the ritual of making to the forefront, framing or binding the experience through the transformation of the participants, both performers and spectators. Matthew Toole"""""""""""""""

� of �17 21Case Study!"Playing with iron for the first time!"On Sunday the 22nd of July 2014 I was lucky enou� gh to take part with some of the test pours at 17pedvale . The cupola was operated by a diverse team of Latvian and Americans and captained by Karlis Allanis. Iron pouring coming from a bronze casting felt chaotic and wild which is a strong part of its appeal. Molten metal spurts out at horizontal angles and there are splashes and sparks and a lot shouting above the roar of the cupola. It’s an experience which is both invigorating and exciting. I’m not sure if I’d want all my metal pours to be like that but I am wholly happy with the experience. The whole process took in excess of about 7 hours and a team of ten or so of us poured around half a ton. I can see why and how some people involved iron pouring into the performance that it is. It can feel like a heavy metal (not the music) ballet with fire on top. Everyone needs to know their position and their role.""

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� of �18 21Case Study!"Aizpute Iron Casting Symposium!"Serde is a residency centre in Aizpute and arts space in western Latvia. It has been running since 2002 and been hosting artist, residences, symposium from a range of different disciplines from ceramics, conservation, to name but a few. I Joined them for the Iron casting symposium run every year there. ""The Iron casting symposium is Run by Kārlis Alainis since 2006 and he is very much the epicentre of of the artistic iron casting scene in Latvia. Karlis is a classically trained sculpture, ex soviet sergeant and lecturer at The Riga academy of arts. He’s also a prolific maker of his own work as well as doing numerous other private commissions and fabrication. In 2006 he recast the key to Riga city after it was taken away during the soviet period. He asked the people of Riga to donate their keys to melt down, to then be turned into the key of Riga city. This was done live in front of an audience of many thousands of people and on national TV.""I did learn much from Kārlis and his mold making techniques which were impressive and resourceful. It is easy to be spoilt with high grade materials then forget how to cast with other materials.""14

Battling cold iron with oxygen lances Latvian style!"On the night of 5 july we got to pour the many molds that we had made over the previous week at the Aiis. Every year it is made into an event for the local community to come look at the spectacle. The equipment is taken down to the lake a 5 minute walk away and people can come watch upon the hill overlooking the area where all the equipment is taken to. ""This year v is making a cast iron plaque for a local musician who had recently passed. This was the first thing to be cast and I was honoured that Karlis asked me to pour it with him. Later on in the evening Kārlis Alainis did an amazing piece of metal casting showmanship that will be one of my most engrained memories of this journey. It was the act of unveiling the plaque in front of an audience of 200 people ready and waiting to see it, in all its glory. The plaque had come out perfectly. Now as a founder who does live casting this is very bold, most of the time the cast come out well, but foundry is fraught with unexpected errors that can and do happen from time to time. So being brazen enough to offer of the casting to the audience as first view takes gusto and confidence of your own skills. "

Image: Karlis Alanis unveiling plaque at Aizpute Symposium 14

� of �19 21 "About three hours into the evening something was up. Kārlis Alainis our iron Mentor was shouting and swearing in Russian in an exciting (for the spectacle) but alarming manner. The Cuppolette had started to freeze up. This means that cold iron has got to the bottom Cuppolette which makes it near impossible to get molten iron out. This had happened several time the weeks before at the iron pour convention. There it had spoiled many iron pour performance pieces in stopping the life blood of an iron performance the molten iron. So I was not surprised that this process of freezing up had happened, here in Aizpute. At this point there are two options (that i know about) that one can do. Drop the bottom of the cuppolette and start the entire furnace again, this would take several hours. Or you can get an oxygen lance. The oxygen lance I had only heard talked about in "

"15"""whispered tones at the iron pour convention. To my limited knowledge people don’t like to use it too ""much as oxygen is such a reactive gas and shoving pure oxygen into a cupolette has the potential to be volatile. I asked Karlis about the use of oxygen and he insisted that it was quite safe and my "gut reaction and academic I agree with him. I’m not sure if this is the same process as a thermic lance which is used to cut through up to 200mm steel and concrete. I will research further into this.""Anyway, at this stage the oxygen was called for and a small team went off to a local workshop. After a tense 20 mins of a frozen cupolette the oxygen arrived and then set up. Now the reasons that it’s called an oxygen lance is the fact of it being a oxygen tank attached to a very long pipe (the lance.) After forcing a hole in the spout the oxygen lance was inserted into the once pouring spout of the cuppolette and it went up like a flare. The air by the exhaust burned white with intensity. A wonderful sight incited by drama."

Image: Oxygen Lance Inserted into cuppla15

� of �20 21"Conclusion !"The end product of this fellowship was to be able to synthesise the knowledge gained into a bell founding performance. Upon my return to the UK I worked with Writer Nick Hunt and Sculptor Jo Lathwood to devise a performance for Wilderness Festival in Oxford.""The basic layout of the show is Nick Hunt describing the creation process of a bell, through reciting passages from Friedrich Schiller’s text ‘Song of the bell.’ He interlaces Schiller’s words with bell related stories, as well as describing the culture and trepidations of the bell founding as a craft and "

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culture to the audience . At the climax of the show a bell is poured. The engagement of the audience with an understanding of the process of the entire bell founding from start to finish allowed them to have an emotional investment in what was being created at the same level as a bell founder may have.""The performance was completed to great success and we have two performance dates for 2015. We are currently looking for touring producers so we can share to as many people, the wonderful romance of bell founding.""I am very grateful to the Winston Churchill Travel Fellowship for this wonderful opportunity they given me. A special thanks to the bell founders of Europe, Antony Kruszewskich of the Kruszewskich Foundry Poland, the Lauchhammer foundry Germany, Johannes and Peter Grassmayr of the Grassmayr Foundry Austria, Hanns Martin Rinker of the Rinker foundry Germany, Peter Glassbrenner of Ars fundendi Germany and finally Brother Michiel of the Maria

Image, ‘Song Of The Bell’ Performance Wilderness 201416

� of �21 21Laach Germany, who were all incredibly generous with their time and wisdom. The iron pour community of Latvia who showed many new forms of performance with a special thanks to Karlis Alanis. Mido Oldenburg my driver, translator and comrade in arms for the German leg of the journey. Without her tenacity of language and understanding of metal crafts, would have led to a much shallower experience. ""And all the St Christophers that have helped me along the way.""October 2014 "17

""David Snoo Wilson""2014

Image, ‘Song Of The Bell’ Performance Wilderness Bell hanging 2014 17